to turn back in your Bibles to
Matthew Chapter 3 as we pick up from two weeks ago where we
left off with our first baptism today. A number of things on
my mind I do want to talk about. I'll try to talk about them at
the end of our service, although there is a lot going on. Matthew
Chapter 3. We will pick up with our PowerPoint
and just go through our basic points and reach point number
four at which we will consider that line of application to the
doctrine of baptism. The title of our message today,
Baptism, Our Cleansing and Freedom. Baptism, Our Cleansing and Freedom. Two weeks ago, our title was
Baptism, The Only Way. And one of the things we have
to do constantly It's recaptured the significance of ordinances
because on a human level, we have a tendency to diminish them
and make them mere rituals, mere forms, almost negotiable practices
in the church. But as I said to you two weeks
ago, and I say again, when you are privileged to be confronted
with the ordinance of baptism and see others baptized, you
are being privileged with an opportunity of seeing the gospel
illustrated. When you and I are allowed to
see men and women be baptized, or you get an opportunity to
observe the Lord's table, both of those ordinances actually
illustrate the gospel when we properly comprehend the gospel.
And so we are taught by our Lord Jesus in the Gospel of Matthews
that we are not to baptize anyone until they have been instructed
in biblical truth so that their baptism is not merely ceremonial
or ritualistic. If I baptize you and have not
taught you the gospel, your baptism is invalid because your baptism
is a confession of faith. And so we reaffirm the biblical
teaching of these things under point number one, our first point,
it's in your outline. The symbol of baptism or the
illustration of baptism under the first concept, and that is
baptism is an illustration of what? The righteousness of God,
the righteousness of God. In the New Testament, baptism
was introduced to us by whom? John the Baptist. He's called
John the Baptist not because he invented baptism, but because
his primary objective under his prophetic calling was to draw
Israel back to God through a radical repentance. a radical repentance. And so the first thing we see
by the gospel writers is John at the River Jordan having his
dwelling in the wilderness, that very unique and ascetic prophet
of whom we have spoken about more particularly last time.
And I have a few things to say about him in a moment. But John
the Baptist has a ministry wherein he is calling the Jewish people,
the covenant people of God, to repentance and faith in God on
such a radical level that they are being called to baptism.
Now the Jewish people were not baptized, they were circumcised.
Why would they then come to baptism, which was an ordinance that was
primarily, not exclusively, but primarily reserved for the Gentiles. Baptism was for Gentiles. It
was for the pagan dogs. It was for the unclean people.
It was for the non-covenantal people. It was for those people
of whom, when the Lord told Peter, as he was sleeping, once again,
even in the New Testament, on the roof in Acts 9, that he could
eat all sorts of animals, he said, what, I have not touched
anything unclean, common at all, Lord. You know I'm kosher. So
Israel was taught a distinction between themselves and the other
nations of the world, which distinctions would be demolished in the person
of Christ. So then why would all of Jerusalem
and Judea start coming to the baptism of John? As we read in
the Gospel of John, they went out to him, verse 5, from Jerusalem
and Judea and all the regions round about. because God had
taught them through the ministry of John that though they grew
up in church, while as yet they did not know the Lord Jesus in
a saving way, they were just as lost as the ungodly who never
saw a Bible in their life. They were no different than the
ungodly who never ever heard the gospel. Now, Martha's then,
what a work of grace God brought in their life. You know, because
we're proud people, aren't we? Especially religious folks, we're
proud. And you're not going to strip us or demolish us of our
ordinances very quickly. And don't come in here telling
us that we're not righteous. And so John's ministry had to
be accompanied by the power of the Spirit for that many Jewish
people to come to the River Jordan as if they were rank pagans. Well, what were they doing? They
were submitting to the righteousness of God. The righteousness of
God carries a broad spectrum of reflection on a theological
level. And we might say, first and foremost,
God is righteous by nature, is he not? It's intrinsic to his
being. And then therefore everything
that God does is righteous. And when we say that we see the
righteousness of God illustrated in baptism, there are two aspects
of it that I want you to consider. The first of which John is setting
forth. When he was told by the Spirit
of God, you are fulfilling Isaiah chapter 40, you are the voice
crying in the wilderness, you are telling men and women to
prepare a way for the Lord to enter in. Get your life right
because Christ is on his way. That was the message of John.
It was a message of repentance. And ladies and gentlemen, the
only people that repent are sinners. These are the only people who
come to agree with God over against themselves and then stand in
judgment against themselves and say, Lord, I was wrong. You are
right. what we understand as well as
we contemplate the analogy of baptism is this that God in his
holiness rightly and justly must punish sin as Sinners the wages
of sin is what and the death that God has in view is ultimately
an eternity Separated from him under his wrath and so we say
that baptism is an illustration of the righteousness of God in
two ways one is a It illustrates the justice of God to punish
sins. Men and women are not coming
to baptism properly unless they see in the illustration of baptism
the punishment of their sins. And so John says that they came
to the river Jordan to be baptized of him. Look at verse 6. And
they were baptized of him in Jordan. What? Confessing their
sins. And you and I saw it over in
verses 7 through 10 when the Pharisees had come to the baptism
as well. I alluded to this and I must
address it again. When he saw many of the Pharisees
and Sadducees come to his baptism, he said unto them, O generation
of what? Vipers. Who hath warned you to
what? Flee from the wrath to come. And some would ask why would
he say that to the rulers of the church, to the elite, to
the lawyers, and to the aristocrats of the church? Because baptism
is a symbol of God's righteousness, and if men and women are going
to escape the wrath of God, baptism is the only way. By illustration. By illustration. In other words,
here's the choice. You can face God in judgment
on the last day. Or you can come to God by bowing
the knee right now, believing the gospel and demonstrate that
God is just to send you to hell by submitting to his righteousness. You can believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ and then enter into the waters of baptism, confessing
him as your Lord. You are need of a savior because
your sin is inexorable. You cannot get rid of it. You
are a hell bound sinner. And the only way of escape is
through baptism. That's the doctrine of the scripture.
That's the and listen Jewry came they came Have you come? and we talked about the wrath
of God being As it were Impressed upon Israel by this enigmatic
prophet called John the Baptist remember I told you he was kind
of weird He never went to the temple He never did ministry
in the normal places where ministry was done in Israel. He was separate
from Israel. Why? Because he was an omen to
the whole nation. Isn't that what I taught a couple
weeks ago? That he was assigned to them of God's displeasure
with them. They had broken God's covenant.
And because they had broken God's covenant, though they were going
through all of the outward forms of religion, God had separated
himself from them because they had rejected his gospel. And
John was on the outside. Now you know John was a priest. You guys know that right? He
was at the priestly order. He should have taken his place
along with the priest in the temple That's what his dad was
But God called him to separate himself from Israel to demonstrate
to Israel that Israel was in a wilderness condition That it
was spiritually bankrupt that it was famished famished in their
soul remember Israel is supposed to be the people who are enjoying
the land of milk and honey and the blessings of the vineyards
and the vine trees and the olive trees and the cattle and all
the blessings of the land. Certainly they should not have
been depicted as some weird dude running around with camel's hair
skin on. Oh, camel is cool today. You
guys know that, right? But back then camel was not cool
with a leather girdle. And remember what we talked about
him eating crickets and wild honey. Now I had mistaken last
time and said that the crickets were unclean. The crickets were
certainly lawful. Leviticus chapter 11 says that.
They were lawful to eat right along with a whole bunch of other
stuff that was both lawful and unlawful. Camels were unclean.
The camel skin would have been unclean. It was a sign of their
uncleanness. But you could certainly eat the
crickets if you want to. But the crickets weren't what
they were called to. They were not called to a diet
of locusts and wild honey. They were called to a diet of
grapes and olives and cattle and sheep and blessing. So John's
diet was a very unique omen against Israel saying that you guys have
been separated from the blessings of God. Separated from the blessings
of God. And yet people heard this weird
prophet and came to him because they recognized Something in
his message rang true and God was calling them to his grace
So when we baptize people and you see them go down into the
water, what are they doing? They're going down into what
death? Death it's called the death of
sin and the death of Christ by those who believe that Christ
died for them And then the second point of righteousness of which
we called your attention last time was his power to raise from
the what? Dead. When we bring those people
up out of the water, it's a symbol of the what? Resurrection, of
which I'm going to develop a little bit more fully in our fourth
point. But his justice to punish sin
is illustrated in baptism. His power to raise from the dead
is also an illustration of the righteousness of God. We taught
this very plainly a few weeks ago. If you say that you have
died with Christ, and that's what faith means, you are also
saying, therefore, you have risen with him also. And that's what
faith teaches. If you have died with Christ
and you have risen with Christ, you are illustrating the righteousness
of God. Because had Christ not been righteous
in his life and in his death, he would have never risen from
the grave. The only way we know that he was the holy, harmless,
spotless Lamb of God, when God poured the whole of his people's
sin on him, and he was laden with God's wrath at the work,
he rose again from the dead, because the grave couldn't hold
him, because he was the only righteous man in the world. And
what we love about baptism is this, it illustrates the simplicity
of the gospel, that a hell-bound sinner like you and me can have
the righteousness of God appropriated to us by faith, so that we stand
before God just as righteous as Jesus Christ. That's absolutely
phenomenal. Phenomenal. And that's what baptism
illustrates. It illustrates that in more.
Point number two, let's go on. The sufferings of Christ as the
sinner's substitute. Remember what we learned in Luke's
Gospel, chapter 12, verse 50? That our master associated his
atoning work for our sins with baptism. Remember what he said? I have a baptism to be baptized
with, and how am I constrained, limited Shut up until that be
accomplished. Do you guys remember that text?
Pull that up. Luke chapter 12 verse 50. There
it is. I have a baptism to be baptized with. Now you and I
know this is not water baptism, right? Because he had already
been water baptized by John, hadn't he? So what kind of baptism
is Christ talking about him now having to endure the wrath of
God, the justice of God, his death on the cross? So ladies
and gentlemen, when you consider baptism, consider Calvary. If you don't, you don't have
Christian baptism. And so he said, my baptism, his
immersion, his death, his his ablution, him being overwhelmed
with God's will in his life in terms of him being the sacrifice
and substitute. He says, I'm straight and I'm
constrained until it be accomplished. And under that point, we saw
two things. There's no man in the world, according to point
number two, of which I believe you will quickly agree, that
delighted to do the will of his father more than Jesus. What's
remarkable about Christ is this. He loved to do the will of his
father. There was nothing about him ever
that had him averse to his father's will. Didn't I use the analogy
a couple of weeks ago about this blasphemous picture that was
on the internet? about some picture of a baby
that's supposed to be Jesus, and Jesus is being wooed or warned
by Mary that he needs to come get in the water. Now, you know
all babies don't like water. And Jesus is kind of standing
back, no, I don't want to get in the water. How blasphemous
that depiction of little baby Jesus is. It implies that the
persons, and it was a pastor who posted that, it implies that
the persons who posted that does not understand that there is
an immutable, unchangeable agreement between the father and the son
that never is broken even though they have independent wills.
The will of the father and the will of the son are always in
harmony. They are independent for they
are independent persons, as is the Holy Ghost. But their wills
never conflict like ours do. There's one baby that came into
this world that loved his daddy to death. And that baby is our
substitute. And so you and I must always
thank God for the one man that did what we should have done.
Because we didn't do it. And we still don't. And by the
way, that's how we know the babies that come out of our womb our
loins are sinners because they always resist our will even at
the earliest ages uh-huh they're not holy sorry not intrinsically
they're little vipers and theological diapers as I've told you before
sinners who need a Savior just as much as their mom and daddy
Am I telling the truth? There's one man who loved God
with all of his being and that was the Son of God. And the second
thing that's remarkable to us as we learned in Isaiah 54 through
7 is that he was fixed on his father's will so much that he
set his face like a flint. You know what that means? He
wasn't distracted by the noises. He wasn't distracted by the arguments. He wasn't distracted by the deceptions. He wasn't even distracted by
the needs. Sometimes people had a need you
saw that in the gospel and he'd leave them alone because he had
to do his father's will Mary and Martha fell out Because Jesus
didn't show up on time as they saw it And when he showed up,
they had a fit you remember how Martha was talking Lord had you
been here Lord had you been here? Forgetting that Jesus is himself. Very God You know what? That
means he can never be laid because he's omniscient and omnipotent
And whatever he breaks, he can fix. Isn't that right? Now, if
I'm late and you die, I'm sorry. We ain't raising nobody from
the dead. We gonna get ready to do the funeral stuff. You
can be mad at me. But listen, the Lord's always
on time, right? And we saw that significantly.
And I say that because there's two things you always wanna contemplate
about your Savior. His impeccable love for his father. Unique to him alone. No creature
in the universe has that kind of love. And then his commitment
to you and me as his people. This is the thing that ought
to float your boat every day you look up and see gravity working
on you. This is the thing that ought
to float your, you'll get it in a second. It'll float your boat. What'll float your boat is that
Jesus loves you more than you love yourself. Yes! That he would
endure the wrath of God. and do his father's will, knowing
that it would accrue to our benefit. This is the magnificence of the
gospel. This is the magnificence of it.
And so when we contemplate baptism, we would be committing a major
atrocity if baptism didn't center in on the person and work of
Jesus Christ. And what are we talking about?
The sufferings of Christ on Calvary Street, point three. The union
of Christ with his people. That's Matthew 3 again. What
you and I are doing when we observe baptism is we're watching by
way of illustration how that God moved from heaven to the
earth and joined ranks with us. No other gospel in the world
depicts a God like this. He became like us in order that
we might bear his attributes for all eternity. So when we
contemplate the doctrine of union with Christ, our union of Christ
with his people, I want you to remember what I said two weeks
ago. God moved towards us. We did not move towards him.
God moved towards us. And he came a mighty long way,
didn't he? He came from glory. He came all
the way from glory to assume our nature, to attach himself
to us in order to take us back to glory with him. It's a movement
on his part. We were passive, he was active.
We stood still in our mess. We didn't even know him, didn't
want him, didn't care about him, and he still chose to say yes
to his father. He still chose to come in the
fullness of time. He still chose to be born of
a woman made under the law to deliver us who were under the
curse of the law. He brought himself into union
with us. Remarkable that God in the person
of Christ would identify with you. See, we're talking about
union. Magnificent trans action on the
part of God towards sinner He became just like you and me and
then we learn a little bit about that last time I took you to
Luke chapter 22 verses 29 through 34 on that And then I talked
to you about how Christ right before he got the Calvary told
his boys Sell their clothes and go buy some swords. Remember
that I had a holy whole lot of y'all jacked up on that one.
I Had y'all jacked up But I told you Christ loves some thugs too.
See, you can disregard it all you want to, but Peter was a
thug. And the apostle Paul was a thug. And some of those cats
were real thugs. I'm telling the truth. And what
did he say? Sell your garments and get some
swords. And we talked about the significance
of that. Many people are blown away. Why
would he have them have swords when he knows he's going to be
taken by the authorities? Is he ready to go to go to war
on a physical and political level? No, he was going to teach us
a lesson about the nature of the spiritual battle of the kingdom
of God between Christ and the dark forces of this world. But
he was also fulfilling scripture. He was numbered among the what?
transgressors. He made his grave with the rich
and the wicked in his death. He says, since we got to fulfill
scripture, boys, y'all go get y'all swords. Since we gotta
fulfill scripture, I'm gonna let you act out a little bit
so we can fulfill that scripture. See, let me say something. If
you don't get it, the gospel is a sinner's gospel. If somehow
you think you are better than the other transgressor out there,
you have never heard the gospel. And might I say, if you were
with Jesus and was passionate about Jesus as Peter was, you
would have fought off those who wanted to take Jesus too. If
you loved him, you would have. Peter took that sword out and
went to hacking, didn't he? Bless his heart with the hacket. Took that servant's ear off,
the right ear. And I told you the significance
of that. This servant was poorly advised
to take his place with that unauthorized high priest called Caiaphas.
And you and I are under one or two leaders. Either we are under
Christ, the true high priest of the kingdom of God, or we're
under some false authority, some false mediator. And if you are
under a false mediator, it's evident by your opposition of
the gospel. You will oppose the gospel. Your
system will oppose the gospel. You will fight against Christ.
And when you fight against Christ, you're going to lose. Because
apostolic doctrine will cut your right ear off so that you never
hear the gospel ever. Am I making some sense? But if
you want to God's elect, and you know, we get stupid until
we come to know the gospel. Is that true? Many of us have
opposed the gospel by adopting a false religious position, thinking
we had ears to hear and eyes to see, but we were blind as
a bat and deaf as a goat, weren't we? And we were fighting against
God until he opened our ears. Doesn't God have to open our
ears? Doesn't he have to open our eyes? So some of us have
intimated that poor servant who lost his ear by fighting with
Peter, the Lord Jesus in his mercy healed him, gave him a
hearing ear. I could see him switching sides
after that day. When you got a high priest like
that cat that can fix wounds in the battle, I'm going to be
on his side. All right, let's move on to our
next point. Let me see here. Point number
four, the union of the believer with Christ. I love the ordinance
of baptism and the ordinance of the Lord's table because the
gospel is clearly preached in them. I said the union of Christ
to the believer is Christ moving towards us. And we only realize
that when he grants us the ability to believe on him. How remarkable
a work he engaged in and undertook to save us. But when once you
have become a believer, One of the chief evidences of your believing
on the Lord Jesus Christ is your response to him in the waters
of baptism. See now that he has moved towards
us we move towards him. And see when we get in the water
we are saying to the whole world I love him because he loved me
first. It is kind of a natural thing
that takes place in the waters of baptism. A love relationship
a union between the two. This is why long ago in the ancient,
ancient church, the Orthodox church, often when the man and
the woman got married, you know what they also went through symbolically?
What a baptism. To bring the two together because
marriage must be always owned as a type of Christ in the church. When once you and I divorce marriage
from Christ in the church, the marriage can take on any form
it wants to because it has no eternal substance to it. Am I
making some sense? And so here the believer by baptism
moves towards Christ since Christ moved towards us. It's a response
of faith. It's not a cause of our salvation.
It's a response, is it not? Every believer that enters into
the waters of baptism is already saved. They already know God. They are simply confirming it
publicly as He said to do. If you confess me before men,
I'll confess you before my Father in heaven. If you enter into
the waters of baptism for me, acknowledging that you're one
with me as I'm one with you, that means you're ready to die
for me as I died for you. I will confess you before the
holy angels and my Father in heaven. That's a good deal. Anywhere
in the universe, that's a good deal. I'm telling you baptism
is significant. We play it down because we don't
know the gospel So Romans chapter 6 verses 1 through 4 gives us
the exhortation to understand again the centrality of Christ's
death in it. Let me read these portions before
we go on to our fourth point Romans 6 verses 1 through 4 what
shall we say then that What shall we say then, shall we continue
in sin that grace may abound? What's the answer, saints? No!
God forbid! Grace doesn't give you room to
live like hell. Verse 2, God forbid, how shall
we that are, what, dead to sin? See, what baptism teaches us
is that we die to sin when we take our place with Christ because
Christ died for our sins. How shall we that are dead to
sins live any longer in there? The apostle Paul is making the
argument logically that if you comprehend baptism, that baptism
is an open acknowledgement, as I had said earlier about the
Israelites, of a radical change, a radical change. When those
Jews came to the waters in Jordan, they tripped the whole polity
of the church out. Because you just don't get baptized
as a Jewish person. You're admitting that nothing
in that whole ceremonial system could ever cleanse you of your
sins. And they were right. They were right. To enter into
such radical expression of repentance and confession of sin on the
part of Israel glorified God. This is why when Jesus was battling
with the Pharisees, he asked him a question. John's baptism,
let me ask you, was it from God or man? Remember that? So they
were always trying to catch Jesus in his words and twist his words
and prove that he wasn't Messiah. And Jesus said, you're asking
me whose authority I'm doing this by. Let me ask you a question.
Very Socratic in nature. Let me ask you a question. Whose
baptism is John? Is it from heaven or is it from
man? And when he gave them that tongue-tier,
they shut their mouth. Because they knew intuitively
if they said it was for man because they were political preachers
They were gonna have to deal with the ire of the people See,
that's what you do when you're political preacher you stick
your thumb in there You determine whether the political winds blow
one way or the other and you make sure you don't tell the
truth Even if it means holding your peace there are a whole
lot of men and women going to hell behind guilty silence and
See, that's the way we do it in politics. Just keep your mouth
shut long enough, people will forget about it. But now if they
say it was from heaven, then the people will say, well, how
come y'all didn't come get baptized too? Because now if this is from
God, aren't you the leaders who should model for us obedience
to Christ? Why are we coming to the waters
and not you? So our Lord, being impeccably
wise in his ability to argue, just shut them up. He put them
in check. He didn't do checkmate. He just put them in check, like
he does all the time. So, God forbid, how shall we
that are dead to sin live any longer in it, any longer therein? Verse three, do you not know
that so many of us, as we're baptized into Jesus Christ, we're
baptized into his what? Death. Therefore, we are buried
with him. That's why we immerse. Argue all you want. Therefore,
we are buried with him by baptism into death. That like as Christ
was raised from the dead by the glory of the father even so we
should walk in what? Your heavenly father expects
you to get up out of that water Functioning as a new creature
somebody that loves God and is down for God as much as God is
down for you. I Are you hearing what I'm saying?
Isn't that language very clear? Radical repentance. Radical repentance. Let me say
this before I go into my fourth point. I do want to get to that
because that's the main one I want to deal with here today. Listen,
there are a lot of people who come to the waters of baptism
for the wrong reason. Some people come to the waters
of baptism because they want security for eternal life. Wrong
reason. Baptism doesn't secure you for
anything. It basically guarantees you that
when you get up out of that water, you're going to have hell to
pay. Let me help you if you don't get it. See, baptism is a sign,
a symbol and an inside to the whole world that I'm on Jesus
team. See, so now you're exposed because
you've got your military outfit on and you've got your rank and
everything. Now everybody knows you're on
Jesus' team. The enemy can see you for who you are. He's coming
after you now. Will you be an empty suit or
a substantive soldier ready to fight this battle? And many go
AWOL shortly after baptism because of the fury of hell coming after
them for having made an empty confession of faith. Am I making
some sense? That's why you don't rush to
the water. Don't rush. You're just as dirty on the outside
as you were when you got in. and you're just the same on the
inside. If you go in justified by faith, you come out justified
by faith. If you go in unbelieving, hoping that somehow you can merit
righteousness by that water, all you're going to do is incur
more guilt to yourself. Am I making some sense? More
guilt, more guilt. So we do it because we love to
exalt the Lordship of Jesus Christ in obedience to the command baptized. We want to, but we want you to
understand that the grounds of confidence by which you come
to the waters, is that you are so clear that Jesus Christ is
your Lord that you are compelled to do it because you want to
glorify him in your life. Now, having said that, I do say
for those of you who hesitate, you scare me to death. Didn't we learn it last week,
two weeks ago? What makes you better than the
person that's on the side of you that decided to do it and
you don't? What makes you think you're gonna be any closer to
heaven? Am I making some sense? Here is a simple illustration
of faith in your heart. You say you're a believer in
Christ, but you won't get water baptized. You're in open disobedience
against him. That basically tells me you're
just talking. Because nothing is more easy
as an ordinance to fulfill than to just go put some shorts on
and a t-shirt and get in the water. It gets harder from there. It gets harder from there. So
I'll leave that alone and I'll let you work with that because
we live again in a country where we think we can have Jesus' marriage,
but we don't want him as Lord. He can't tell us what to do.
Now hold on now, Lord, you didn't save me, but don't tell me what
to do. Okay, and so these what you are what you are observing
today will be your own condemnation If you are delaying out of some
pride or out of some foolish Notion that it's all right for
you to maintain a viable walk with God without a public Acknowledgement
of his lordship in the waters of baptism. Let's just solve
that right now That's just go ahead on it understand this last
point the symbol of our confidence is his resurrection 2nd Peter
chapter 321 this is going to move us towards our text which
our text will then help us to affirm what I'm about to talk
about now very frequently when people ask me about baptism they
ask questions like Can my children be baptized? Can my babies be
baptized? Can, can I, can you know, we're
baptizing cows and horses and dogs and birds today in our liberal
churches. You guys do know that, right?
We're baptizing everything that we think will go to heaven. It's
not crystal centric. It's not biblical. It is blasphemous,
but we're doing it, but we're doing it because we're ignorant.
We're doing it because we're ignorant. What Peter says is
baptism is the response of the conscience. Baptism is the response of the
conscious. When the people that come up
today and are baptized, having sat under this teaching for a
long time and gotten it real clear, they're coming because
their conscious says, I believe that Christ rose again from the
dead. And because he rose from the
dead, I am completely justified from all things of which I could
never be justified by the works of the law. Listen to what Peter
says. The light figure where unto even
baptism also doth now save us. Not the putting away of the filth
of the what? You're still dirty when you come
out the water. But the answer of a good what? conscious towards
whom? Stay right there. God does something
in the preaching of the gospel that brings the mind of the renewed
soul into his presence and affirms the renewed soul that he is secure
for all eternity. That he or she or they never
ever have to worry about God rejecting them again. The conscious
is able to say as a consequence of faithful preaching, I know
that it will be well with my soul now that Christ has risen
from the dead. See, it's a response of the conscious. That's the inner sanctum of which
no man can enter. That's between you and God. When
you come into these waters, you are saying yes to God in your
conscience. And you're saying yes because
of the revelation. The revelation. The revelation. You and I are saved by revelation. A knowledge of the glory of God
revealed to us. This is what makes preaching
the gospel so powerful. It pleased God through the foolishness
of preaching to save. and the preaching of the gospel
by the Spirit of God penetrates the conscience and gives light
to the mind and it eases the soul and it breaks the guilt,
breaks the fear, breaks the anxiety. It brings the sinner to Christ.
It brings him to God. It sets him in the presence of
God, Coram Deo, until the conscious says, I'm all right with God
by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. Listen
to what he says. but the answer of a good conscience
toward God because Christ rose. Look with me in Romans chapter
4 verse 25 and then 5.1 and then I'm going to share with you an
illustration that actually affirms this point and will be done for
today. In Romans chapter 4, here's what
Paul says to us about faith and its justifying component. In Romans chapter 4 verse 25,
I'll start here. He's talking about Abraham He
says concerning Abraham that he was saved by faith and his
life was an illustration of that in verse 24 Not for them, but
for us also to whom it shall be imputed. That is the righteousness
of God Now watch this it will be imputed to us if we believe
on him that what raised up Jesus our Lord from the what and The
focus right now is the resurrection. Y'all got that? Stay with me.
That's a concept critical to baptism. The resurrection. See
again in liberal churches, they do not believe in the bodily
resurrection of Christ They'll talk about a mystical resurrection
a social resurrection a spiritual resurrection a emotional resurrection
a psychological Resurrection a kingdom resurrection, but they
do not believe in the actual bodily resurrection of Christ
Nor do they believe in the actual penal justice that God poured
upon him for our sins It's all a farce We believe that Christ
actually rose from the dead. And we believe that he actually
rose from the dead as a substitute for his people, not for himself,
for us. And we believe that when he rose
again from the dead, that the father was declaring him by that
resurrection to be the son of God. Because only God can rise
again from hell. Christ rose again from hell He
rose again from the depths of hell from the punishment of hell
from the extent of hell and hell is eternal It's not a place.
It's an experience. Is it not and our Savior swallowed
up Jordan? He swallowed up hell if our Savior
did not take the whole of the wrath of God And left some of
it for you and I to have to deal with we'd still be in hell for
all eternity Am I making some sense to you? You and I do not
have to go to hell because Christ paid the price for it in total. And the resurrection lets us
know this. How powerful is this upon the conscience? It's so
radically powerful that I need to call your attention to the
analogy of it in the book of Leviticus chapter 14. Go there.
This is where I'll now launch our thoughts. Now, this is an
interesting ordinance that God had given to Israel in the wilderness. And this is the law of the leper. the day of his cleansing the
law of the leper now for some of you these eight verses will
also evade you and here's the reason why you don't see your
connection with the leper but I'm gonna try to help make the
connection for you can I do that I want you to see that the leper
is you and me apart from the grace of God And that the ordinances
that God provided in the book of Leviticus are what we call
gospel ordinances. Because the gospels preached
everywhere in the Bible from Genesis to Revelation. And that
this is a great day in Leviticus 14. A hypothetical day in that
time, but a great day. What do you mean hypothetical
preacher? Meaning that there was no Jewish person in all of
the Old Testament who Became healed by the process of God
Providentially healing that person of which the high priest would
go out and examine him and say whoa It appears that your leprosy
is clearing up here Let's observe those ordinances by which you
now can be brought back into the community. I See, even though
God promised a time wherein healing of that nature would take place,
it never took place while as long as Jesus had not shown up
on the earth. This is in hypothetical ordinance
that would point to the days of Messiah. When were lepers
healed? In the days of Messiah! Prior
to that, we had a couple of lepers healed in the scriptures, right?
And those two of those lepers were what? Gentiles. Gentiles. Remarkable. Gentile. So what
you and I are dealing with is a hypothetical. Let's hypothetically
assume that there was some very fortunate leper who one day woke
up and started to see a remission of his leprosy. Leprosy killed
you. Back in the day, a very severe
case would destroy your body. It's a type of sin, is it not? Leprosy is a type of sin. And
sin is in our DNA. And sin contaminates the whole
of our being, although initially it doesn't look that way. Again,
like our little babies, we call them cute, little angels, holy,
all that. Six months in, you take off some
of those predicates. About two or three years, you're
wondering whether or not they're even your child. But what they
are are sinners. They come from Adam's stock,
as do you. But they show themselves having
the stain and the seed of sin in them. And so they start opposing
you, resisting your authority, and then doing crazy stuff. The
reason why we have gray hair is not because we're old, it's
because our kids turn into teenagers. From teenagers to young adults
is when we lose all our black hair. Is that true? Sin is represented
by leprosy in that it was generally and normatively in that day incurable,
it was also pervasive, it grew. It also represents sin in this
way, that some lepers could cover up their leprosy because spots
and blotches were on parts of their body that you could cover
up with clothing. And so like that leper who could cover up
his blotches of leprosy with clothing, so we do it by religion. We cover up the blotches of our
sin by religious duties. Reading our Bible, going to church,
praying, looking like Christian folk. We have this salve called
Bible verses, and we rub it on our leprosy. But see, that's
external. What the high priest knew when
he examined the leper, he knew that the leprosy was always more
than skin deep. So the healing had to be thorough.
It couldn't be merely an external healing. It had to be a healing
deep down inside his tissue. And so you and I are sinners
thoroughly. And the healing that we must have must be deep down
inside the tissue. It must be a transformation of
our soul. Are you hearing me? A new nature
imputed that will begin to swallow up that old nature. and bring
us to a place where we finally experience the glory of God.
And so let's look at the gospel here in Leviticus chapter 14
verses 1 through 8. I am not going to do a long exposition,
but I think those of you who love the gospel will clearly
see this. Verse 1, And the Lord spake unto
Moses, saying, This shall be the law of the leper in the day
of his what? Cleansing. He shall be brought
to the priest. Point number one, if the leper
is ever to be healed, he must be brought to the high priest.
Who is the high priest? The Lord Jesus Christ. Might
I also say then that him being brought to the high priest is
a illustration, an illustration of the sovereignty of God to
take the sinner from where he is in his defilement and in his
sin and in his guilt and to bring him to the only one that can
declare him clean. Do you know what that means?
You don't come to Christ. Christ comes to you. And when
you do come to Christ, the Holy Ghost brought you there and sat
you in front of the only high priest that can declare you clean.
Beautiful. Now, look how wonderful our high
priest is. Verse three, the priest shall
go forth out of the camp. Do you see it? This is how much
he cares for us. He came to us. Lepers could not
be inside the community. They were outside of the community.
And so when Jesus left heaven, he came outside of the camp to
meet us because we are lepers. He came where we are because
we couldn't go where he was. You and I have been exiled, kicked
out of the kingdom of God. You and I are excommunicated
from the church because of the corruption of sin. But we have
a high priest who is so holy that he can go outside of the
camp to touch you even though your sin is contagious. I told you this before, you cannot
communicate righteousness to anyone else. Your husband your
wife or your child your righteousness will never work for them. You
can't communicate righteousness, but you can communicate sin Am
I making some sense and that's what we do do but there is one
who can communicate righteousness His name is the lord jesus christ
and he is the high priest who loves laying his hands on defiled
sinners Has he touched you? Has he laid his hands on you?
See, this is what we saw in the gospel, isn't it? Our master
went everywhere touching folks, laying hands on folks, picking
up nasty sinners, putting them in his arms, saying such is the
kingdom of God. And those arrogant, pompous,
self-righteous Pharisees would say, ooh, he's touching sinners. Remember that? How can he be
a master in Israel when he's touching sinners? If Christ does
not touch us, we will remain unclean. If he doesn't touch
us, we will never be healed. Touch me, O Lord, in every part
of my body. I need all of the communicating
of your righteousness I can get because I am a desperately hell-bound
sinner from the top of my head to the soles of my feet. And
unless you touch me, I will die in my sins. We got a mighty high
priest. That's why the Hebrew writer
called him a great and merciful high priest. How bold he is to
come into the leper camp. That's what this world is, a
leper camp. How bold he is to come into the
leper camp and look upon you, look upon you. There it is, verse
4. Verse 3, and the priest shall
go out of the camp. The priest shall look and behold if the
plague of the leprosy be healed in the leper. Then shall the
priest command to take for him, that is the leper, to be cleansed.
Watch this now, two birds alive and clean. You guys see that?
The birds here are pigeons and they can also be translated doves.
These are the little sacrifices of the poor that Israel was given
right to use when they couldn't offer a lamb in sacrifice. Pigeons
and doves were very precious to the poor people. We used to
eat them in the hood. Tastes just like chicken. Practical purposes, you understand.
But they would take the pigeon and the dove, which was the sacrifice
of the poor, and they would offer them up to God, give them to
the priest in lieu of the sacrifices because they couldn't afford
a lamb. And I told you this before, the gospel is not only for sinners,
it's for poor people. I mean, some folks are too broke
to buy a lamb. If you had to buy a lamb to be
saved, you're going to hell. Cause you too poor? Isn't God
good? Now watch this. There's even
an ordinance in the scriptures that if you was too poor to even
catch a couple of doves and pigeons and they ran around everywhere,
you could offer some flour to God. Just a little meal. God
is able to save to the uttermost anyone that comes to him by faith. Isn't that good? Okay, let's
get to the gospel here. Whenever you and your Bible see
the number two, two people, it's the number for witness. It's
the number for union, and it's the doctrine of substitution
being taught. Two pigeons. These two pigeons
represent one, the leper that's before you, the other, the Lord
Jesus Christ. You're getting ready to learn
a gospel true. Did Christ assume our human nature? Did he become
sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God in him?
Is Christ everything that we are? Are we not also everything
that he is? So he assumed a position of being
just like me. So he was a turtle dove and I
was a turtle dove. Do you see the picture? And so
the language is that the priests were to actually go through this
ordinance in the presence of the leper. So the leper is observing
this. I am the leper being told by
my high priest that I'm clean. But he's going to explain to
me in this ordinance how he made me clean. Here's what he said. He said, now you take these two
birds, clean two birds alive and clean and cedarwood and scarlet
and hyssop. Do you guys remember those articles
in the use of the ministry of the temple? See, the cedar wood
was one of the primary woods that was used in the building
of the tabernacle in the wilderness. The cedar wood comes out of Lebanon,
the cedars of Lebanon. The cedar wood is a prominent
wood that was used in the building of the temple in Solomon's day.
Why cedar wood? Because cedar wood grew to be
large. It was plentiful. It was a beautiful tree and it
also was hard. which meant that cedar wood would
endure the oxidization that would take place over the years. Y'all
learning something new today? That's exactly why God had them
to do it. Like if you have some woods that are very porous and
don't have the kind of constitution that a very hardwood does, that
would rot in a few years, right? Well, trees in the scripture
are frequently a symbol of humanity. And our Lord Jesus Christ became
one of us. Is he not also a tree of righteousness? Is he not a tree of life? Is
not he the true vine? But the Bible tells us in Isaiah
chapter 61, verse 3, that you and I are trees of righteousness
as well. See, in other words, when the tabernacle was built
in the wilderness, it pointed not only to Jesus, but to us,
because he assumed our humanity. He actually redeemed our humanity. So what we have is a cedar wood
here as part of the component of this ordinance Along with
scarlet who knows what scarlet represents in the scriptures
the atonement of jesus It represents the blood and we have a scarlet
colored thread running from genesis to revelation Do we not blood
blood blood blood blood without the shedding of blood? There
is no what remission of sin? I need the scarlet color three
remember what uh, joshua told rahab when rahab said hey, we
heard I believe Would you deliver me and my house? You know what
he said? Stick a scarlet colored thread out the window. And whenever
we see that scarlet colored thread, we'll pass over you. As God passed
over Israel when they put the blood on the doorpost during
the exodus. And what did they use? Hyssop
to dip the blood and put it on the doorpost. See, these are
all the components necessary for the atoning work of Jesus
Christ for our sin. Watch the gospel here now. This
advised leper is understanding what he has seen. He has seen
the reason for which the high priest would declare him clean.
Look at what it says in verse five. And the priest shall command
that one of the birds be what? Oh, now we see death, don't we?
Do we see death? One of the birds will be killed
and it will be killed in an earthen vessel over what? So here we
go. Now we have our senses exercise
on another spiritual level. Why kill one of the birds? He's
innocent. That's what our animal rights would say, right? He's
innocent. Poor thing. Let him go. Well,
we have to kill him because one of the birds has to become a
substitute for sin. Do you see the doctrine? Either
we kill this bird or we kill the other bird. One of the two
got to die. And because that leper understood
the doctrine of Messiah, he understood that that little innocent dove
represented the harmless Lamb of God, Jesus Christ, who would
be the sinner's substitute. That bird was killed, had his
neck broke, throat slit, and the blood poured into an earthen
vessel. What is the earthen vessel? Our
humanity. We have this treasure earthen
vessels that the excellency of the glory of God might not be
of us but of him so Christ now is identified with our humanity
in that earthen vessel and it was all to take place with running
water the pouring of water over the top of the vessel now again
the idea of running water for Israel was a very prominent metaphor
literally the word means living waters it's not God The source
of living waters is not the living water the ministry of the Spirit
of God that brings life to our soul Watch this then this little
bird is a picture of Jesus Christ the sinner substitute who had
to die the death of the God-man under the anointing of the Spirit
of God See this was a consecrated work It was a work that God himself
was doing. Christ was consecrated by the
Spirit of God to die for our sins. Now watch this now. Watch
this. Notice what he goes on to say
in verse 6. And asked for the what bird? The living bird. You better thank God. That living
bird better thank God. Lord, I thank you that that wasn't
me. That living bird there by an act of providence is made
to live while the other bird died. Of course, this bird doesn't
have the mind of a human being, so he can't be thankful. He's
just as ignorant and dumb as any creature. But the leper standing
before this ordinance sees clearly that he identifies with the living
bird. Are you hearing me? Watch this.
and ask for the living bird. He shall take it and the cedar
wood and the scarlet and the hyssop. Take the living bird
and dip them, dip them. Do you see it? Dip them and the
living bird in the blood of the bird that was killed over running
water. Do you see the doctrine? Do you
see the doctrine of baptism here? Do you see the doctrine of union
between the sinner and Christ? Do you see how you and I must
be dipped in the blood of the Lamb of God in order for our
sins to be removed? Do you see it? Glorious. Glorious. That leper is being
taught the gospel right in front of his face. He sees the doctrine
of substitution. He sees the doctrine of the incarnation.
He sees the doctrine of union. Now he sees the doctrine of the
atonement. He sees himself now having been
brought into union with Christ by his death. Do we not need
the blood? Do we not need the blood? Now
unto him who loved us and washed us in his own blood. That's right. Without the shedding
of blood, there's no remission of sin. Unless you and I are
identified with the blood, we will stay in our leper sins forever,
forever. Glorious gospel truth, don't
you think? This brother sat there and had
his great high priest, Jesus Christ, preach Christ to him
and show him how he is declared by his high priest to be clean
on the grounds of a work of atonement Union and substitution in the
death of Jesus Christ watch this Saints look at verse 7 and 8
for me This is so cold and he said and he shall sprinkle upon
him that is to be cleansed from the leprosy Seven times what
is he sprinkling on him the blood see the leper now having watched
the the little dove be immersed in the blood now himself is about
to come into contact with the blood and See, if you're going
to be consecrated, if you're going to be cleansed, if you're
going to be justified, if you're going to be sanctified, the blood
must be sprinkled on you. The Spirit of God must take the
blood of Christ and sprinkle it on your conscience. Sprinkle
the conscience clean. Hebrews 9, verse 15. The blood
of bulls and goats could never take away sin. But He, Jesus
Christ, purged us from our sins in his own blood. He purged us. He purged our conscience. He purged our conscience. Hebrews
chapter 9 verse 15. I want the saints to see it.
Now look at this, children of God. This is the work of Christ
and the purging of our conscience from our sins. If you have your
Bibles, turn there. Hebrews chapter 9 15. I just
want you to see that verse. And then we'll go on to close
here. One more glorious truth about this illustration of the
atonement and cleansing of this leper. Are you there in your
Bibles, Hebrews chapter 9? Notice what it says. Glorious
the Hebrew writer makes it clear to us in verse 12 neither by
the blood of goats and of calves But by his own blood he entered
in once into the holy place having obtained eternal Redemption for
us for if the blood of bulls and of goats and the ashes of
an heifer Sprinkling the unclean sanctifying to the purifying
of the flesh. Here it is. How much more? Shall the blood of Christ who
through the eternal spirit, see the water, see the running water,
who through the eternal spirit offered himself without spot
to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the
living God. Isn't that good? Do you see it?
Do you see it? What can wash away my sins? Nothing
but the blood of Jesus. What can make me whole again?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus. What can clear the guilty conscience? Nothing but the blood of Jesus.
Do you see it? Do you see it? Go back to our
text. One more point there. He shall
sprinkle upon him that is to be cleansed from the leprosy
seven times. Seven times is the number of
perfection. Perfect cleansing. And shall pronounce him clean. Who's pronouncing him clean?
Jesus. Who's pronouncing him clean?
His high priest. And once he pronounces him clean,
watch what this leper sees. And he shall let the living bird
loose into the open field. The leper gets to see what he
is in the living bird when that bird flies off, liberated, freed,
emancipated from his sin, from the curse of the law, from the
wrath of God, excommunication from the church, no longer. He
sees his resurrection in the resurrection of Christ. Do you
see it? He sees his resurrection. This
is why David can say in Psalm 124, around verse 3, Psalm 124,
go there. He says, my soul has escaped
like a bird out of the snare of the fowler. Listen to it. This is a beautiful analogy and
metaphor of it for him as well. Here it is, Psalm 124, verse
7 and 8. Our soul is escaped. Isn't that
liberation? Our soul is escaped. What do
you mean escaped? Rescued, delivered as a bird
out of the snare of the fowler. Ladies and gentlemen, we were
all in the snare of sin, in the trap of sin. And that snare and
trap was broken. By whom was it broken? Christ. Now listen to what he says, and
we are escaped. When the leper looked at that
bird taking off, he saw his liberty from the curse of that leprosy.
His soul was elated when he saw it. Now, ladies and gentlemen,
again, I'm done here. Listen, that's hypothetical.
I would say that there was no Israelite at that time that ever
saw a pigeon or a dove land on their doorstep or their porch
or their house dipped in blood. If they did, you know what they
would know? Jesus Christ has just pronounced somebody clean.
See, because that bird would have been a symbol of the liberation
of the guilty hell-bound sinner. Are you hearing what I'm saying?
One more verse in our text and we're done. This is what I meant
by cleansing. Baptism is a symbol of cleansing. Cleansing. It's
a symbol of our liberation. It's a symbol of our freedom.
We have been freed to serve God. set free from our bondage and
servitude to sin and Satan and liberated to serve God. Again, Leviticus chapter 14,
verse eight. I thought this was so remarkable.
And he that is to be cleansed shall wash his clothes, shave
off all of his hair. You know, we do that in the 21st
century, a bunch of bald-headed folks. You guys know that, right?
See, nothing new under the sun. And he shall wash himself in
water that he may be clean. And watch this. Here it is, Saints.
Here's the man that was exiled, separated from his family, separated
from the community, separated from the people of God, hence
separated from God. And after that he shall come
into the camp. Do you see it? After he washes,
goes through the ceremony, he gets to come back into the camp.
Do you know how good he must have felt to be accepted back
into the kingdom of God? Everybody could walk past the
leper's camp and see them. They were a scorn and a ridicule
to society. Even his kids and his wife couldn't
touch him. Can you see the joy of the soul
to be able to be let back into the camp? When we baptize men
and women, we are saying this is how you enter into the kingdom
of God. Except you be born of the water and of the spirit.
You shall not see nor enter in am I making some sense? I am
not saying the water does that it only illustrates what is done
Here's what he says. He shall come into the camp and
watch this. He shall tarry abroad out of
his tents seven days I Went over my time, but I want you to think
about that here. You are separated from God by
your sins Everybody keeping their distance from you because you're
a leper and you're contagious Now you have been brought back
into the camp because you have been declared holy Perfect clean
righteous before God you are part of the citizenship the Commonwealth
of Israel again And you know what God said don't go into your
tent stay outside for seven days So everybody can see what the
Lord has done for you how God has saved you by his grace washed
you and made you clean purged you of all your sins and Healed
you of your leprosy so that you can be a testimony to everybody
of the saving grace of God in Jesus Christ That's why we do
what we do and we're gonna have our offering right now We want
those who are going to be baptized to get ready our women first
in our men later after our offering if you want to you can depart
or you can stay and join us in this baptism ceremony