Back here in Ephesians chapter
2, Paul in verse 20 tells us that the foundation, the ground
of acceptance before a holy God for every sinner ever saved,
whether he was a prophet of the Old Testament or an apostle in
the New Testament or in our own day, If God is pleased to this
very hour call someone out of darkness into his marvelous light,
they will rest upon that one foundation that no man can lay,
that God himself has laid, and that foundation is the Lord Jesus
Christ himself. That's what Paul says in verse
20. and he's lost none of his power,
none of his virtue, none of his merit. Before God, he is that
one, that only one in whom God the Father is well pleased, And
everyone that's in Christ Jesus, he's well pleased with as well.
Isn't that comforting? Paul in verse 20 says that Christ
is that foundation, that chief cornerstone, Jesus Christ himself. What a subject. The greatest
subject of the Christian religion is not found in things. man-made religion, that's true. But the most wondrous fact of
the faith of believers is Christ himself. He's the greatest wonder
of all. Indeed, the prophet said his
very name, his very person, shall be called wonderful. Those precious
truths in God's Word, those sweet doctrines of grace, as we call
them, They find their beauty in Jesus Christ himself. Otherwise, they're nothing. They're skeletons. They're meaningless.
Oh, but viewed in him, and that's what we'll attempt to do, God
enabling us this morning, consider a few of those blessed truths
as they relate to the Lord Jesus Christ. He himself gives the
comfort and assurance of every promise of God to us. He is the
truth personified. Christ is the embodiment of truth. In John's Gospel chapter 1, we
read this, that the Word, the eternal Word, someone said that
the Word of God is about God the Word. The eternal Word that
made everything that is made, The Word was made flesh, John
writes, and dwelt among us. Imagine that. Imagine that, Lord. God Almighty became a man, came
down here, was made in the likeness of sinful flesh, was made like
unto his brethren, and dwelt tabernacled for a little while.
among us, and John says, we beheld, we beheld His glory. God revealed
to us who He was. As he said to Peter, you're a
blessed man, Peter, because I'm going to make you rich. That's
how the world observes or considers someone to be blessed, if they're
rich, if they're wealthy, if they have much of worldly goods. But our Lord said to Peter, you're
a blessed man because God the Father, my Father's done something
for you, Peter. And he's not done this for everyone.
My Father has revealed to you what you could never know otherwise. That's what he said, didn't he?
Peter, flesh and blood didn't reveal this to you. You didn't
arrive at this knowledge, this revelation of who I am by your
own smarts. It doesn't come that way. It
doesn't happen that way. Peter, my Heavenly Father has
revealed to you Who I am, and John said we be held to him.
And we know he's the only begotten of the Father. And John, what
impressed you? What impressed you about him?
Oh, everything, but especially this, he's full of grace. He's
full of grace and truth. In Luke's Gospel, chapter 24,
after our Lord rose from the dead, and he appeared unto those
two disciples as they walked on the way to Emmaus, and afterwards,
After revealing himself to them, they go and tell the disciples,
but the disciples didn't believe it. It seems like the news of
our Lord's being raised from the dead didn't seem to make
much difference to them until this happened. We read in verse
26 of Luke 24, and as they thus spake, Jesus himself, there it
is, There it is. Jesus himself stood in the midst
of them and saith unto them, Peace be unto you. Oh, there's the difference. There's
the difference. There's the glory of the gospel.
There's the comfort to every believing sinner. There's the
foundation alone that gives us a good hope today, tomorrow,
and forever, that'll bring us into the very presence of God
without fear, because even then, God will behold us without fault
before his throne. Why? Because we'll be there robed
in Jesus Christ himself, his perfect righteousness. Brother
Henry, let me share just a brief word or two by our dear friend
Henry Mahan along this very line. He said, you may weary of hearing
me say it, but salvation is not in a decision. It's not in a
profession of faith, not in a mental acceptance of facts, not in the
letter of the law. Salvation is a person. This is what Christ told Martha,
who insisted that she believed in the resurrection. He said,
I am the resurrection and the life. We live because He lives,
and we are in Him. We are righteous because He is
righteous, and we are in Him. We are accepted because he is
accepted and we are in him. Paul cried, all that I might
win Christ and be found in him. Jesus Christ himself. You men that have had the pleasure,
I suppose you would consider it a pleasure, of shopping with
your wife, for example. And as you follow her around
the store, in the women's clothing department. She takes a dress
off the rack and says, honey, what do you think of this? What
do you think of this? And you say to her, or at least
think to yourself, I just can't tell too much about it. I just
don't know. But then she goes and tries it
on. That makes all the difference.
These glorious doctrines of God's Word concerning His Son, as we
view them clothed in Him, then and then alone they find all
their beauty. Their beauty is derived from
Him. Look, if you will, back in Luke
chapter 24. Our Lord appears to His disciples,
and we're told in verses 44 and 45 this, and He said unto them, These are the words which I spake
unto you while I was yet with you, that all things must be
fulfilled." I like that. Don't you like that? No wonder
even his enemies had to confess, never a man spake like this man. He doesn't say all things might
be fulfilled. Or there's a possibility of fulfillment.
No, no, no. He says all things must be fulfilled
which were written in the Law of Moses and in the Prophets
and in the Psalms concerning me. That's all the Bible they
had at that time. Then opened he their understanding
that they might understand the scriptures. The key to understanding
the scriptures is Jesus Christ himself. In John 14, that very
familiar verse, that night, just before he went to the garden
and gave himself to the enemies, that would take him away to be
crucified. He told his disciples, don't
let your heart be troubled. Don't be afraid. If you believe
in God, you believe in God, he said. Believe also in me. And he said in verse 6, I am
the way, the truth, and the light. He's the way. He's the way. I've said it before, but he's
not one way. He said emphatically, I'm the
way. I'm the only way. Not merely
that I show you the way or that I teach you the way, but Jesus
Christ himself is the way in both directions. The way to God
and the way from man. From God to man. All the mercy, all the grace,
every blessing from God comes through this channel, this source,
this river of grace flows to thirsty, needy sinners through
Jesus Christ himself, nobody else. Nobody else. Do you want
mercy? Do you need God's grace? Do you
hunger and thirst after righteousness? Do you feel your desperate and
utter need of God's great salvation? You can only have it. You can
only experience it as you look to Him, the Lamb of God. Oh, may God enable you to behold
the Lamb of God. You'll never get over it. Now,
at the end of this service, if I would practice the custom that
is practiced in most churches of giving a so-called altered
call, I don't do that and I won't do that. Christ is not here.
You don't come to Christ with your feet. You come to him with
your heart. It's with the heart man believeth
unto righteousness. But if you were to do that, and
I would shake your hand and tell you you were saved, that's not
how you behold the Lamb of God. That's not how salvation comes
or say the sinner's prayer. Oh, no, no. Salvation is in the
look. The look that God gives you.
The revelation of His Son to your heart. He opens your eyes. He is the light. Himself is the
light and He opens our blind eyes to behold Him. He illuminates
us to behold the Lamb of God. Joe, what a sight! What a sight! My, to behold Him, to see Him,
the One who loved man and bore all my sins in His own body on
the tree. Oh yes, He's the way. And He's the way for a man to
God. What do I mean by that? He brings
us to God by His offering. His righteousness. That's the
way by which we approach God in the Lord Jesus Christ. Paul
said in Hebrews 9, He appears in the presence of God for us. Now you talk about an advocate
with the Father. You talk about being well represented
before God Almighty. By Jesus Christ himself, we could
not be better represented. He also said, I am the truth.
I am the truth, the incarnation of truth, the truth of God, the
truth of salvation, the fulfillment of all the types and the shadows
under the law. Jesus Christ himself is the only
answer to this question. I know religion gives multiple
answers, multiple choice. Take your pick. One is as good
as the other, not according to God's Word. In answer to this
question, how can a man be just with God? Now, that doesn't cause
too many people in our day to stop, to consider. They don't
see any great difficulty in that. To be just with God has been
whittled down to mean nothing than something I do for myself. Oh, but when God in His mercy
and grace teaches a sinner something, oh, gives him an awareness of
something about who God is, what happens? What happens then? What
happens? Before that, a sinner will strut
around, he'll pop his suspenders and say, look at me. But if he
ever has an idea, if it ever dawns on him, by God's work of
grace in his heart, who God is, you know what he'll do? He'll
do just like Job. I've heard of you with the hearing
of my ear, or rather with the hearing of the ear, but now my
eye seeth thee. And what did you do, Job? Did
you strut? He said, oh no. Job said, I abhor
myself. I'll shut my mouth and bow down
in the dust where I belong. Isaiah, in the year that King
Uzziah died, Isaiah said, I saw another king. I saw the king
of kings high and lifted up. And what did you do, Isaiah?
Did you go around bragging about what you saw, what you had, what
God had revealed to you and nobody else had experienced yet? No,
he said. He cried, woe is me. I'm undone, I'm a man of unclean
lips, I'm a sinner and everybody around me is in the same boat. Oh no. In answer to the question,
how can a man be just with God? There's only one answer. There's
only one answer. This is what the apostles preached.
In Acts chapter 13, listen to what Paul told the people in
the synagogue at Antioch. In Acts chapter 13 verse 38,
Paul said, Be it known unto you therefore men and brethren, men
and brethren, that through this man is preached unto you the
forgiveness of sins, this man, this man, that is the Lord Jesus
Christ himself, and by him, by him, all that believe are justified
from all things from which you could not be justified by the
law of Moses. I love that picture. I love that
story our Lord gave of justification In Luke chapter 18, that very
familiar parable, two men went up to the temple to pray. The
one was a Pharisee, a separated one. And he stood and prayed
thus with himself, Lord, I thank you I'm not like other men. I
don't do this, and I don't do that, and I don't touch this,
and I don't wear that, and I don't drink, I don't smoke. I'm not
like that publican down there. The publican wasn't standing
there at the holy place. Oh no, he didn't feel like he
was worthy enough. He stood afar off, and he had
such low opinion of himself that he wouldn't even lift up his
eye. Toward heaven. All he could do was smite repeatedly
upon his breast. Lord, be merciful. Lord, be merciful. I'm the sinner. That Pharisee's
right. I'm worse than he is. I'm worse
than everybody. There's not a greater sinner
in the world than me. And you know what our Lord said?
You see the publican, he's going home justified. In the court of heaven, this
very day, under his name, there is recorded not guilty. Not guilty in the court of the
triune God. Oh yes, Jesus Christ is the truth
and the way. And Jesus Christ himself is the
life. He's the source of life, he's
the giver of life, of spiritual life. As God has life in himself,
he's given power for the Son of Man to have life in himself.
In the hours coming he said that all that are in the grave shall
hear the voice of the Son of Man and they that shall hear
it shall live. That's what I want my sons to
hear. They've heard daddy's voice for years. I mean, since they
were this high, and my daughter, they've heard daddy speak to
them for years. Oh, and they pretty much just
turned a deaf ear to it. We've heard that before. We've
heard that before. But oh, I'm praying that God
Almighty will speak to them. And they'll not turn to death
here. They'll not turn to death here to Him, because if the Great
Shepherd seeks them, He won't take no for an answer. Aren't
you glad that's true? He will not take no for an answer,
because the Son of Man came to seek and to save all those the
Father gave Him. And when He comes to them and
says, live, they'll live. They'll live. When He drops grace
into their hearts, they'll believe, they'll repent, and they'll come
to Him most willingly. Most willingly. They'll be made
willing in the day of His power. Yes, spiritual life comes from
Him. Eternal life as well. I give
my sheep, He said, eternal life. My sheep have eternal life. Life
that shall never end. I and my Father are one. And none can pluck them out of
our hand. I give them eternal life. And they're going to live forever. They're going to live forever.
The life that's in them is the same life that's in me. Jesus
Christ himself, when he appeared to John on the Isle of Patmos,
he said, John, I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the
ending, the first and the last. Jesus Christ himself was there,
standing before God for his people before the world was, before
time began. Salvation is not a new idea on
the part of God. When Adam fell and all men fell
in him and died spiritually, it didn't catch God off guard. God's not that small. That sounds
more like a mere man. Oh, no, no, no. Before there
was a sinner, before there was a sinner, before we fell in Adam,
Christ stood for us before the Father. He's the beginning. and the end. And He will be there
for us when time shall be no more. As Bobby sang a moment
ago, when this world When God is done with it, when time shall
be no more, behold, the Lamb of God will stand as He always
has, from eternity past to eternity to come. He'll stand as the representative
of His people. And it will be the boast of the
captain of our salvation, Father, here I am, and here's all the
sheep that You gave me. Here they are. Here they are.
I've lost none. Enter into the joy prepared for
you from the foundation of the world. I read a statement by
a well-known preacher the other day, and he made this statement. He said, when a man preaches
the historical facts of Christ, he preaches Christ. When he affirms
the historical facts of the Christian faith, he's preaching the Christian
faith. When he believes these historical facts, he is believing
the faith itself. No. No. That's not so. That's not so. Preaching is not
declaring some bare facts. It's declaring the person of
Jesus Christ Himself. We believe not mere facts, but
the person of Jesus Christ. Paul didn't say when he sat in
that dungeon cell in Rome, waiting to shortly be executed, he didn't
say, I know facts. I know facts about Christ. Oh,
I find such comfort in having some facts in my head. Oh, it
just warms my heart, these facts. No, no, no. He said, I know whom,
I know whom I have believed and He's able. He's able because
He's the mighty God. He's the everlasting Father.
He's the Prince of Peace. He's able to keep everything
I've committed unto Him against that day. Whom? Not what? And there's a world of difference.
There's a world of difference. Jesus Christ is the only body
of divinity that I want to know. I believe Him. I trust Him. He's my only hope. I don't have
anything else, anything else, nothing else, no one else but
Jesus Christ himself. Let's just, and we'll be brief,
concerning each of these. Let's just consider four or five
of these blessed truths, these doctrines of God's Word concerning
our salvation that find their sweetness only, only as we view
them in him. Apart from him, they offer no
comfort. like Martha before her dead brother's
tomb. She said, Oh, I know, in response
to our Lord's promise of him rising again, she said, Oh, I
know that he'll rise again. I mean, you can just tell. She
doesn't derive any comfort from that. She just sort of brushes
it off. Oh, I know that he'll rise again
in the resurrection at the last day, but, oh Christ, very gently,
and very lovingly brought her to see that the resurrection
was not a dry, lifeless, cold, and distant theological theory,
but that the one who stood before her at that very moment, Jesus
Christ himself, was the resurrection. And you talk about a visual demonstration. She saw that when he said, Lazarus,
come forth. And oh, how she viewed him then.
Oh, she looked at him in a way that she never did before. Mary,
he is all together, lovely. He is perfect. There's no fault
in him. We believe here, and you'll hear
the word from time to time, it has a way of slipping out, the
glorious doctrine of God's election. But God forbid that I should
ever teach that. or that you should ever consider
it apart from Jesus Christ himself. God's choice of sinners to salvation? Imagine that. God saves people
on purpose. Yeah, he does that on purpose.
His own eternal purpose. God grants grace because he determined
to grant grace. I am the Lord, I change not.
Paul said, we're bound to give thanks. Because God had from
the beginning chosen you to salvation. Who saved us, he said to Timothy,
not according to our own works, but according to his own purpose
and grace which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world
began. Blessed, the psalmist wrote.
Blessed is the man whom thou choosest and causes to approach
unto thee. Turn back, if you will, to Luke
chapter 10. Luke chapter 10. 70 disciples
other than the 12 our Lord had sent out to preach the gospel,
to cast out demons, and they just come back rejoicing in that
fact. But our Lord tells them in verse
20 here in Luke 10, notwithstanding in this rejoice not that the
spirits are subject unto you, but rather rejoice because your
names are written in heaven. Your names are written in heaven.
In heaven, there's the Lamb's book of life. And under His name,
Jesus Christ Himself, our glorious head, the names of all of his
members. Your names are written in heaven.
In that hour, Jesus rejoiced in spirit and said, I thank thee,
O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that thou hast hid these
things from the wise and the prudent and has revealed them
unto babes. I have, by God's wondrous grace,
a reservation in heaven. I've told you before, Donnie
Bell called me the other night, said that he had arranged for
me to stay with a family. I've stayed with them many times.
They're in Crossville, Tennessee during the weekend of the conference.
I told him that would be fine. And to be honest with you, I
breathed a little sigh of relief because usually when Donnie is
supposed to make me a reservation, he forgets to do it. And I don't
find out until I get to the motel and tell them, I'm Larry Criss,
I'm ready to check in. And they say, we don't know you. We don't have a reservation for
you. God Almighty won't forget. Peter wrote that God has has
for us an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled that fadeth not
away, reserved in heaven for you." Reserved. Isn't that glorious? Just waiting
our arrival. Salvation. God chose us in Him
before the world began. Thou art my first elect, God
said, and then chose us in Christ our head. Josiah Condor wrote,
"'Tis not that I did choose thee, for, Lord, that could not be.
This heart would still refuse thee, had thou not chosen me.
My heart owns none before thee, for thy rich grace I thirst.
This knowing if I love thee, thou must have loved thee first."
When you think of redemption, don't think about a theory of
atonement. Oh no, but of him who atoned
for all our sins, Jesus Christ himself. When you think of redemption,
he loved me and gave himself for me. He said to God's justice
and law, as he said to those who came to arrest him in the
garden, if it's me you seek, let these go their way. He Himself bore our sins in His
own body on the tree. God made Him to be sin for us. A cloud of God's wrath, God's
hatred against sin was brought above the head of His dear Son
and made to pour down upon Him all the wrath of a holy God. And the result of that is this,
He that was made sin for us, we are made the righteousness
of God in Him. That was a real man nailed to
the cross. God's own Son. And God forsook
His own Son. It wasn't a theory. It wasn't
a word. It wasn't a doctrine. But He
was the living, breathing, loving Son of God. Spurgeon wrote, O
Son of God, I know not what to admire the most, thine height
of glory or thy depths of misery and salvation. Salvation is not
knowing what, but who. The majority of people we know,
when they speak of salvation, they speak of what? Things. The scriptures speak of salvation
as being Jesus Christ himself. Lady, he spoke to the woman at
the well, if you knew the gift of God and who, and who? If you knew who it is that speaks
to you, you would ask of him and he would give you living
water. This is life, he prayed, that they might know thee the
only true God and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent. Knowing Christ, the sinner has
all that God can give, all that he'll need in this life
and throughout eternity. Christ is all, Paul wrote, and
you're complete in him. Complete means entire. It means
full. It means perfect. It means to
lack nothing. In Christ I have all that God
requires. And God can require no more.
And a sinner can possess no more or need no more than this. Jesus
Christ Himself. In Him dwelleth all the fullness
of the Godhead bodily. And you're complete in Him. You're
in Him. What can you like? What can you
like? Oh my, I can lay down and sleep. I can rest there. I can rest
easy there, wrapped up in the righteousness of God's own Son. When we speak of the second coming
of Christ, I've heard men talk about when and where and how
and what Multitudes of books have been written making predictions
and setting dates about the Lord's second coming, and they've all
been wrong. They don't have a clue. I remember
years ago a fellow called me, a preacher, a pastor, and he
wanted to enlighten me as to when the Lord was coming again.
And he said, Larry, just give me a few minutes. It's real simple.
And he said, in Daniel there's 70 weeks, divide that by 2, subtract
this, add that. And I thought, I thought you
said this was simple. I need a calculator. And I'll tell you
what happened. I literally fell asleep listening to him on the
phone. It was so boring. There was no
Christ in it. Depression is not when or where
or what, but who's coming. The Lord himself shall descend
from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, with
the trump of God, and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Heaven. Heaven. What is heaven? It's to be with
Him. It's to be where He is. It's to behold The Lamb of God,
like He said to the thief on the cross. Isn't that something?
Isn't that a glorious prospect, Lonnie? Today, He may say that
to you or I. Today, you'll be with me. You'll be with me. What can compare
to that? You'll be with me today in Paradise. Jesus Christ Himself. God bless you. Thank you for
your attention.