Psalm 19, the heavens declare
the glory of God. The skies proclaim the work of
his hands. Day after day, they pour forth
speech. Night after night, they display
knowledge. There is no speech or language
where their voice is not heard. Their voice goes out unto all
the earth, their words to the ends of the world. In the heavens
he has pitched a tent for the sun, which like a bridegroom
coming forth from his pavilion, like a champion rejoicing to
run his course. It rises at one end of the heavens
and makes its circuit to the other. Nothing is hidden from
its heat. The law of the Lord is perfect,
reviving the soul. The statutes of the Lord are
trustworthy, making wise the simple. The precepts of the Lord
are right, giving joy to the heart. The commands of the Lord
are radiant, giving light to the eyes. The fear of the Lord
is pure, enduring forever. The ordinances of the Lord are
sure and altogether righteous. They are more precious than gold,
than much pure gold. They are sweeter than honey,
than honey from the comb. By them is your servant warned,
in keeping them there is great reward. Who can discern his errors? Forgive my hidden faults. Keep
your servant also from willful sins. May they not rule over
me, and I will be blameless innocent of great transgression. May the
words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing in your
sight, O Lord my rock, my Redeemer. I've got an account on Facebook,
an internet networking site, they call it, social networking,
and it keeps me in contact with some faraway friends, and one
of those friends is John Davis. Some of you know John Davis.
We often refer to him as the banjo man. He's a member at Central
Baptist Church where Brother Paul Mahan is the pastor, and
I've known him Fifteen or so years. Always he's been a blessing
to my heart. But I noticed some comments he
had made on his Facebook page. It said, I'm sitting here watching
the sun rise over, I believe it was a certain mountain. And
where he lives, it'd have to be rising over a mountain of
some sort because that's all that's there. And, of course,
me being from the East Coast also and knowing what that land
is like, it brought back good memories of mountains and trees.
But he added some comments afterwards, some scriptures, referring to
the Lord as the Son of Righteousness, the S-U-N of Righteousness, who
rises with healing in His wings. And since we are friends on Facebook,
I was able to put a comment on his page. And what he said reminded
me of this scripture. And so I pasted that into his
page and said, there's a picture of our glorious Savior. And I
began to think on this scripture. And I told him after I made a
few comments, I said, I feel a sermon coming on. And he said,
well, I hope you post it to sermonaudio.com. If this is any good when I get
done this morning, I'll do that. I'll put it up on sermon audio.
He may be able to listen. But this is a statement, a revelation
of the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the Son that's mentioned
here. Now, in the English language,
it's only a matter of coincidence, maybe, that the word Son, meaning
the male child of someone, is a homonym of the word Sun, meaning the star in the
sky that lights our earth. And so it can almost sound confusing
because you say he's the son of righteousness. Well he is
and he's the S-U-N of righteousness and he's the S-O-N of righteousness.
But here in this The Son of God is illustrated by the sun up
in the sky. Now God reveals His glory in
several ways. The chief way He has revealed
His glory is in His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. It says in
a prophecy in Isaiah, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed. Now what event was Isaiah talking
about when he mentioned the glory of the Lord being revealed? He's
talking about the appearance of the Lord Jesus Christ in the
world. And so the glory of God is revealed first and foremost
in the Lord Jesus Christ. Second to that, and something
closely related to that, the glory of God is revealed in the
Gospel, which is the testimony of the Son of God. It's the testimony
of God concerning His Son. And then thirdly, the glory of
God is revealed in the Scriptures, because the Scriptures are a
written record of the testimony of God concerning His Son. And
then we get down to fourth, and one of the other ways that God
reveals his glory is in nature, in his creation. And in particular,
the heavens are created in order to declare the glory of God. The heavens seem to have a particular
ability to reveal God's glory. So far as natural revelations
are concerned, you can't do better than the heavens. Now, again,
it says the heavens. Let me tell you why it says heavens
instead of just heaven. One of two ways. First of all,
when things were big, they often referred to them in the plural.
They were just too great for singular. Now, in English language,
we don't talk about the plural or use the plural form of a noun
unless there's more than one of it. But evidently in Hebrew
language it didn't require that there be more than one heaven
in order to talk about the heavens, just a whole lot of heavens.
And you know, when you look up in the sky, there's a lot of
it up there, isn't there? And so he refers to the heavens.
Also, the Jews believed in three heavens. In fact, I think most
ancient civilizations did, or they divided the heavens into
three. There's the heavens, which is the sky, the atmosphere, where
the birds fly and the clouds float. And then there's the heavens,
which we would call outer space, where the sun, moon, and stars
are. And then there's heaven, which is God's throne, the place
where God exists. And so maybe that's why it's
saying the heavens, because it does mention here, it says, the
skies proclaim the work of his hands. But whatever, it was the
heavens that's visible to the eye that he was speaking of here.
And these heavens are able to declare the glory of God because
the heavens, just like God, are out of our natural reach, all
we can do is behold them. You know, a natural man by his
own searching can never find out God. Job says that, who by
searching can find out God? We can take the best human minds
and get them all together and say, all right, you discover
God, and from your own natural understanding and what you're
able to perceive, you tell me what God's like. And they aren't
going to be able to do it. Man has an innate sense that
there is God. And yet, he cannot find out God
by his own observation. And even we, who have been given
a knowledge of God through the work of the Spirit of God, what
do we know of God? Really, all we can do is just
stand there and behold Him. And I'm reminded of that psalm
that says, This one thing I ask of the Lord, that I may dwell
in His house forever and gaze upon the beauty of the Lord.
Now when I prepare messages, I've got to do some study, just
plain old study, trying to determine the meaning of the words that
are being used, and comparing them with theological things,
and it gets to be an intellectual exercise. And there's got to
be some of that going on. You don't understand anything
unless you understand words and this sort of thing. But when
I am done with all that kind of study, I believe necessary to the preaching
of a good message, that spirit of no matter how much I study,
really all I can do is just stand here and behold and tell you
what I see, the best I can with human words. You know, the Bible,
which was inspired by God, the Bible is not even sufficient
to reveal to a man God. Otherwise, everybody had a Bible,
no God. There is something about God that is beyond the ability
to comprehend intellectually, beyond the ability to describe
to anyone else, yet every believer beholds the beauty of the Lord,
gazes upon the beauty of the Lord, and is swept away by it.
Just like sometimes, have you ever done this? You just go out
there at night time and just look. And your mind isn't filled
with, well, how far is a light year, and how fast does light
travel, and wonder how many stars there are, and how big... You
just stand there, just amazed at what you see. The heavens
declare the glory of God. They give us somewhat a sense
of the out, or the otherness, and the out-there-ness of God. And we just behold Him. And then
the heavens, like God, are vast beyond our ability to comprehend. We can tally the numbers. Scientists,
they say we believe that the universe is this big. Of course, there's an argument
about that too. I remember within my lifetime, it was 5 billion
years, and I heard 15 billion, and then recently I heard 150
billion. I don't know. I don't know if
they know. I don't know how they'd figure it out. Nobody's been
out there with a measuring tape. They got their idea how big the
universe is, and some say it's infinite. All I know is this. The more we look, and the more
we see, the more we realize that there's a whole lot more to see
than we have ever seen. Vast. And you know, no matter
what you've come to know about God, there's more. No matter
how deep your understanding is, He's deeper than your understanding.
No matter how high your intellect is reached in grasping the nature
of the Most High God, it hadn't reached as high as He is. David
says, such things are wonderful, they are high, I cannot attain
unto them. And then, the heavens, or God
is compared, and the glory of God is declared by the heavens.
Because the heavens, like God, fill us with a sense of our own
insignificance. Look back here. Just hold your
place in Psalm 19. Hold your place. Go back here
to Psalm 8. Right now, in our day, and it's
probably been true in all days, but we really see it in our day,
If you want to be popular in religion, if you want to have
a lot of people watch your TV show and buy your books, and
if you want your name out there where it's well-known, all you
have to do is somehow or another make Christianity about you,
about people. Make Christianity about them,
and they will send you money, and they'll put your name on
their lips, and you'll be famous. You tell them that they're important
and they'll love you. But notice what the heavens,
and therefore God, says about us in Psalm chapter 8 beginning
with verse 3. When I consider your heavens
the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars which you
have set in place, what is man that you are mindful of him?
The son of man that you care for him. You made him a little lower than
the heavenly beings and crowned him with glory and honor. And
indeed, God, when he made man, he was the top dog on the earth,
and he was crowned with glory and honor. And yet David, as
he stands there and looks at those heavens which declare the
glory of God, here's what he says, Why do you even pay any
attention to us at all? Rather than him looking at himself
and saying, Wow, what a great man I am, no wonder God sent
somebody to save me. He didn't say, you know, God's
going to move heaven and earth to save me. He said, I look at
the heavens and I can't figure out why God even knows I'm here. And then, when he considers that
God has taken note of him and has put His favor upon him, then
he's doubly astounded. You look up at the heavens, you
know, and when we think about the fact, what is it, we live
As someone described, we live on a medium-sized planet, going
around a medium-sized star, in a medium-sized galaxy, among
hundreds of billions of galaxies, each of them with hundreds of
billions of stars, many of them much larger than our star, and
probably having planets around them much bigger than ours. And
here we are, just a little piece, so far as what man can see, of
organized organic chemicals. And God takes notice of us. And
when you stand under the heavens, that ought to blow you away.
And not only this, He makes the comparison even more severe when
He says here in Psalm 8, When I consider your heavens the work
of your fingers. We look out there at this universe
which is vast beyond our ability to comprehend, and it's not called
God's heavy work. It's not the work of His shoulders
and legs. It's His finger work, the little work that takes virtually
nothing to get done. And when I think to myself that
the heavens are more than I can comprehend, and yet these heavens
are nothing but the small work of God, how vast is God! I can begin to comprehend what
He is. And then, how amazing to think that He who made the heavens
as finger work looked on this little speck of dust called earth
and saw an even smaller speck called a man and said, I've loved
you with an everlasting love. Brethren, the heavens declare
the glory of God, for the heavens, if we'll listen to them, will
give us a sense of our insignificance and make us stand with our jaw
hanging down wondering why God even noticed us, much less was
willing to send his son to die for us who rebelled against him. Fourth, God is compared to the
heavens and His glory is declared by the heavens because the heavens,
like Him, are everywhere. Where are you going to go and
not be under the heavens? It doesn't matter where you go
on earth. The sky is above you. The stars are up there. The moon
and the sun, they're up there. You can't go anywhere and hide
from the heavens. And what did David say? Whither
shall I hide from thy presence? Whither shall I flee from thy
presence? I can't hide, I can't run from
Him. He's everywhere. Now, I don't
want to hide from Him, not anymore. There was a time I did. There's
a time when, like those people in Revelation, isn't it? There's
a time when we were called on the rocks and the hills to follow
us and cover us and hide us from the face of Him that sits on
the throne. But now we are so glad that our God is like the
heavens, and no matter where we go, we are under His gaze." And then, fifthly, The heavens declare the glory
of God because they, like Him, speak everywhere and in every
language. Look over here at Romans chapter
1, beginning in verse 18. In verse 18 of Romans chapter
1, the wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against
all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth
by their wickedness. Since what may be known about
God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them,
for since the creation of the world, God's invisible qualities,
His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen
being understood from what has been made, so that men are without
excuse." Back in the 60s when the Soviet
Union and the United States were in the space race, They shot
one of their men up there, they called them cosmonauts, we called
them astronauts, but shot one of their cosmonauts up there.
And he looked around and said, well, I can't see God. Well,
then brother, you're blind. You're blind. If you can look
up into the heavens and say there is no God, you've got no sense. You just don't have the good
sense that God gives to most people. I remember, I think,
now I think I've got the right date, it would have been Christmas
time of 1968. And this was the first time that
man went out to the moon. He didn't land, but he went out
there and circled the moon and came back. And therefore, that
was the first time that man ever got to see the earth from the
perspective of the moon. And I remember that when they
got out there and then they began to beam pictures back of what
they were seeing. And rather than make their own
comments about it, as they looked at the heavens from up there.
Do you know what they did? Do you know what they said? I
think it was Christmas Eve 1968. One of those astronauts, representative
of the greatest scientific minds of the day. I mean, they were
sent out there by the pinnacle of human science in that day.
And when they saw what they saw, they said, in the beginning,
God created the heavens and the earth. All the heavens speak a language
that no man can deny, which no man can stop his ears from or
shut his eyes to. It's there. And if he will only
listen, it'll tell him there is a God. It'll tell him He's
the eternal God and that He is infinitely powerful. And then lastly, the heavens
declare the glory of God in that they, like God, are the true
source of the sun. The heavens are the tabernacle
of the sun up in the sky, and God is the tabernacle, the dwelling
place, and the source of Him whom we call Jesus, the Son of
Righteousness. Now in this psalm, Christ is
compared to the Son, to a bridegroom, and to a champion. And I want
to just look at those comparisons that the Scriptures make and
see how they reveal to us our Lord Jesus Christ. First of all,
Back in Psalm 19, last part of verse 4, in the
heavens God has pitched a tent for the Son, which is like a
bridegroom coming forth from his pavilion, like a champion
rejoicing to run his course. Now, how is the Lord Jesus Christ
pictured by the sun? Well, first of all, He is like
the sun in that the sun commands the heavens. I mean, it is the
most brilliant light in the heavens and is king over all the heavens
in the way we look. And the Lord Jesus Christ is
king over all things. King in all the earth, yea, king
in all the heavens, king in heaven itself. Christ, as it were, among
all the illuminations of this world. I mean, you know, we've
got our stars. We've got our little pinpoints of life that
we think are something. And you've got the moon, which
the Bible describes in the book of Revelation, the moon is given
as a picture or an illustration of the church. And the church
is a light in this world. In fact, in those scriptures
that our brother was reading there, The Lord Jesus Christ
goes on to say, you are the light of the world. And the light of
the world, when the sun is gone, the light of the world is the
moon, isn't it? And the church receives its light just like
the moon receives its light from the sun. The church receives
its light from the Son of God and shines it upon this world.
But our Lord Jesus Christ, He commands the heavens. And then
the Lord Jesus Christ is like the sun in that He is the light
of the world. Look here at Psalm 36. The 36th
Psalm. Now were it not for the sun up
in the sky, there would be no light for us to see. The moon
would have no light to reflect on us, so we couldn't see from
the light of the moon. And the stars, well that's just
way too dim for us to be able to gather any understanding of
the world by way of the light that comes from the stars. But
the sun provides all the light from which you and I derive any
knowledge. And here it says in Psalm 36
verse 9, For with you is the fountain of life, in your light
we see light. You and I claim to know the truth.
We who believe the gospel, we say we have the truth. Well,
where did we get it? Is the light natural to us? No.
Like the moon, all we can do is reflect it. The moon has no
light of its own. We have no light of our own.
The only way we see the light is because God has shined His
light on us. And it says there in the 36th
Psalm that with Him is the fountain of life. And in His light we
see light. And then you go over to the first
chapter of the book of John, and it says, In Him is life,
and this life is the light of men. This life of God given to us
from Christ Jesus is that which gives us light that we might
see. and that we might understand.
If any man understands anything spiritual, if a man understands
what he is by nature, a sinner and rebel against God, if he
understands who God is, if he understands something of who
Christ is and what Christ has done by His life and then His
death on the cross, if he understands that, it's because God's Son
has shined on him and given him life. In John chapter 4, we get an
example of this. You might want to turn over there.
Our Lord is talking to a woman from a city in Samaria. And she's full of that Samaritan
religion. And the Lord strikes up a conversation
with her, and finally the woman says in verse 25 of John chapter
4, the woman said, I know that Messiah is coming. When He comes,
He will explain everything. See, the Lord directed the conversation
He had with this woman in order to reveal to her just how confused
she was. Brother Scott Richardson was
preaching, and someone said to him afterwards, you confuse me.
And he said, no, you were born confused. Says, I'm trying to
straighten you out, but it's confusing to you until God gives
you the light. And she says, when Messiah comes,
He'll unconfuse me. I'm confused now by the things
you're saying. When Messiah comes, He'll unconfuse me. He'll explain
it. And the Lord Jesus declared,
I who speak to you am He. I am the light of the world.
No light but His light. And then the Lord Jesus Christ
is like the sun in this regard, where the sun shows forth the
Lord Jesus Christ in this regard, that as the sun in the sky touches
every part of the earth, so the Lord Jesus Christ has gone to
all the corners of the earth and has a people out of every
kindred, tribe, tongue, and nation. Verse 6, it says, Yet, that is,
the sun rises at one end of the heavens and makes its circuit
to the other. Nothing is hidden from its heat. Now, when the Lord Jesus Christ
shines forth, it creates heat. It creates a kind of heat that
can give life. You know, we probably wish we
had a little more of that right now. You know, we've had some
pretty cold weather, and that cold weather can be dangerous.
People die of it. You've got to have a certain
amount of heat. And we long for the sun to come and give us sufficient
heat to keep us warm and comfortable. And you know the Lord Jesus Christ,
when He rises with healing in His wings, as the Old Testament
speaks of Him, He comes and gives us spiritual life and spiritual
warmth and spiritual health. Have you ever noticed how the
sun in the sky can brighten your attitude? Oh, the night can be
so dark and long, can't it, when you're troubled? When you lie
tossing on your bed and you finally get out of bed and you pace the
floor and you look outside and yell, the stars are pretty and
the moon's out there. But what do you want? Oh, that
the sun would rise and chase away the darkness and bring some
light into my mind and heart. And brethren, we dwell in darkness
and coldness and in the realm of death until God's sun dawns
upon us. And even we believers, we go
through times of darkness, don't we? Through times when our soul
is troubled and guilt is upon us and unbelief and doubt begin
to lay hold of us and get a grip on us. And what do we long for? The sun. All that the sun would
rise and banish the darkness from our hearts. He brings warmth, but then He
also can bring a killing heat. I like the sun to make me warm,
but I don't want to live in the desert. The Lord Jesus Christ
can reveal His glory in such a way that it brings judgment
upon men, and they try to hide from it. So the Lord is like the sun in
the sky to rule as the chief of all. to bring light to those
that sit in darkness, and to bring warmth and the life that comes from
it, or excruciating heat and the death that comes from that,
wherever he wills it to be. As the sun in all its glory rises
in the east and covers the whole earth to the west, So the Lord
Jesus Christ rises in glory and glorifies his Father from the
East unto the West. But then it says, the Lord is
like a bridegroom coming forth from His pavilion. Now, in trying
to understand the pictures that the Scriptures make for us, we
have to understand the culture from which they were derived.
When we have weddings these days, who's the most important person?
It's the bride. In fact, nearly every time I
conduct a wedding, I'll make some joking reference to the
men and say, listen guys, If you all would like to go somewhere
and go ahead and get the party started, if you'll just get some
cardboard cutouts of yourself and stand up here in the front,
it'll be all the same because nobody cares about you, nobody's
paying attention to you. Because really, face it, the
groom and the groomsmen are almost insignificant in a wedding. The
only thing the man's got to do is at the appropriate time say,
I do, and then he's done. I didn't mean that just the way
it sounded. I mean he's done with his part of the wedding. I don't
mean he's done for. But that's all he's for. Everything's
about the bride in our weddings. Everybody gets up here and stands,
and everybody's thinking, when's this song going to be over? But
as soon as you hear the chords of that familiar song, everybody
stands up, turns and looks to the back, because everybody wants
to see the bride. She's the glorious one in the
way we do weddings in our day. But that's not the way it used
to be. The glorious one in these ancient weddings was the bridegroom.
He was the one everybody waited for. He was the one that got
all dressed up. The bride may make herself ready also, but
the bridegroom, I mean, he got the finest clothes he could get
a hold of. Not just a bland tux that would make him blend in
and look like a formal stick figure. No, he put on brilliant
clothes and would put a turban on his head and he would wear
jewelry because he wanted to be the center of attention. And thus the Lord Jesus Christ
comes as the bridegroom, as the most important one, as the one
clothed in splendor and majesty. But you know what else I see
from this which touches my heart so much? When the bridegroom
appears, who is he coming for? He's coming for the bride. Do you know what's on the bridegroom's
mind on the wedding day? The bride and intimacy with her. If he's obeyed the rules, he's
waited. If he's done what's right, he's waited. And his heart longs
for her, and God has made man and woman this way. And on that day of the wedding,
What's on his mind? To take his bride and be one
with her. That's what the whole day is
about. And the Lord Jesus Christ, when He comes into the world,
He doesn't come for everybody. He comes for His bride. And He
doesn't come for the party. He doesn't come for the reception.
He doesn't come so much for the ceremony. He comes that He may
have her, and be one with her, and love her, and draw her to
Himself. Everything about the wedding
may be about the bridegroom. Oh, and this is wonderful. Everything
about the bridegroom is about the bride. The bride looks to Him and can't
think of anything else that she wants. But here's a mystery, brethren.
The heavenly bridegroom, the Lord Jesus Christ, looks at the
bride and there's nothing else he wants. When the Lord Jesus Christ came
into this world, He came for a chosen people whom His Father
had given to Him. And for reasons unknown to us,
He loved them. She was ugly. This bride was
ugly. This bride had been unfaithful.
This bride had not kept the vows of her espousals. She was in
every way undesirable. But He comes, and He's the glorious
Bridegroom, and He's so glorious that He may impart His glory
to her and not be diminished by that impartation. And yet
she is made glorious with His glory. In ourselves, brethren,
we are nothing to look at, spiritually speaking. There is nothing desirable
in us. There is nothing that would draw
out the love of God toward us. There is nothing that would draw
the Son of God from heaven to die for us. And that's why we
stand. How can it be that God should
love a soul like me? We sing that. And I tell you,
aren't we still mystified by that? But even though we're mystified
by it, we don't deny the truth of it. Jesus Christ desired the
undesirable. He came for the ugly. He came
for the unwanted. He wanted her whom nobody else
would want. He comes forth as the bridegroom.
And she's dressed in her rags and the symbols of her wretchedness.
But when He comes in the room for her, His glory envelops her. and takes away her wretchedness,
and strips her of her filthy rags, and clothes her in a glorious
wedding garment, and the world will someday stand back and say,
I never knew, and I can't believe it. Look what he has done. Us men go out and look for pretty
brides, That's in our nature to do so.
The Lord Jesus Christ, according to the Scriptures, found the
ugliest and made her glorious by His glory. He is the glorious
Bridegroom. Coming forth from His pavilion,
He's like a champion rejoicing to run His course. The King James
says a strong man Jesus Christ is not that pitiful
failure of a Savior that you hear about so often. He is a
champion. He is not that pale, wasted fellow
you see in the picture with the long hair and his hands on a
rock and a little light coming down on him, looking weak and
effeminate. He is a strong man. He is the
very perfection of humanity. There is no weakness whatever
in Him. Those hours of Gethsemane do
not indicate a weakness on His part, but the great strength
He had to bear the load that was being laid upon His shoulders. He came forth into this world
as a champion, God's champion. The one sent to do battle, the
one sent to run a course. And it was a difficult course.
This was not a hundred-yard sprint. This wasn't even a twenty-six
and whatever it is, twenty-six and three-eighths mile marathon.
This was a cross-country grueling endurance race. ending in death. And he says, shall I pray now,
Father deliver me from this hour? No, it was for this very hour
I came into the world. And he set his face as a flint,
and with a determination that nobody but he could muster, and
with a strength that nobody but he possessed, he came into this
world, and he met every challenge, and was victorious in everything
he came to do. When he said it is finished,
what was finished? His course, his race, his battle,
the work which the Father gave him to do. We're never finished. He's the only man that ever finished
anything. We all leave things undone. He left nothing undone. He's the mighty son. He's the
glorious bridegroom. He is the invincible champion
coming to win. I've entitled this message, Our
Glorious Amateur Savior. You say, wait a minute, amateur
doesn't sound very glorious. Well, that's because we don't
use it the way the word was originally meant. We think a professional
is somebody who's really good, an amateur is just somebody who's
so-so. But that's not what the words actually mean. Initially,
they meant a professional is someone who does something for
money. That's what he makes his living
by. And an amateur was somebody who did something for the love
of it. Now there are some who are both
professionals and amateurs. They make their living by it,
but they also love to do it. And they claim that's the best
kind of life. If you can make your living doing what you love.
So to be a professional amateur. Here's what I'm saying here.
Our Lord, when it comes to saving, when it comes to declaring the
glory of His Father, when it comes to delivering His bride
from the one who's captured her, when it comes to paying for her
sins, when it comes to rescuing her, He's an amateur. He's doing it for the love of
it. Because what does it say here
about this champion? It says he's like a champion
rejoicing to run his course. I want you to see if you can
get a hold of this, even a little bit. Our Lord Jesus Christ did
not come into this world unwillingly. He did not come running His race
as though there were a ball and chain on His ankle and Him plodding
along and hating everything that He did and despising it. He came
bursting forth into this world full of the vigor of someone
who can't wait to get started. Years ago, in the early 80s,
I watched a movie, Chariots of Fire. I like sports movies. I never was good at sports, but
I always liked sports movies, and this was the real story,
the true story. primarily of one runner who ran
in the 1924 Olympics, a Scotsman. And this was back in the days
when most Olympians were amateurs. I mean, it was a rule. So you
couldn't have made your living at the sport you were working
in, in fact, in any sports. And so this man, Eric Little
was his name, he could run. Man, that guy could fly. And
he didn't run for money. He ran for the sheer joy of it.
It's as though that's what he was born to do. And he found
his fulfillment and his satisfaction in running. And so in one race,
he runs and falls down. And it's a sprint, a 440 I believe
it was, and everybody runs by him. Well, you know, in a sprint,
you fall down. There's just no way to catch
back up. He did. He got up and he caught
up and won the race anyway. Why? He was born to run and he
loved it. And therefore, he was not running out of even a sense
of glory. He was running because running
was inside of him. And of course, he won in the
race that he did in the 1924 Olympics. Here's what I'm saying.
Our Lord is such a champion. He came here, not because He
had to, nor did He come here simply because there was a prize
that waited at the end. He came because it was His nature
to do the work He came to do. And when He did that work, every
bit of it, From the grueling effort of being a righteous man
living in a sinful world, yet always doing that which is right
and good. The grueling effort of trying to be loving among
a selfish race. Of dealing with all the words
spoken against him. And the lack of faith even in
his followers. Dealing with all those things.
He did this from his heart. It says at one point that he,
being full of joy, looked to heaven and said, I thank you,
Father, Lord of heaven and earth. Who would look at the life of
the Lord Jesus Christ and find something in there to be thankful
for? Would you be thankful for betrayals? Would you give thanks
for weak friends and strong enemies? for being hungry, for being counted
nothing? Our Lord did. It's the race He
came to run, and He ran it with the strength of someone who loves
what He's doing. And you know what that means,
how that applies, where that touches you and me? All that the Lord did as the
champion of God, He did to save His people. And that tells me he loves to
save sinners. That you and I don't have to
go before him and seek his salvation as though it's something he's
reluctant to do. He is the champion of salvation
who rejoices to get started and to run and to finish. that God would save me at all,
that Jesus Christ would be in the least bit willing to even
think about considering to save me, is amazing. That He should have come into
this world and as it were towed the mark, the starting line,
with eager anticipation to do all that was necessary to bring
this wretched man to himself. That's over my head. That's beyond me, but that's
what he's saying. He is the champion who rejoices
to run his course. The Lord Jesus Christ, all what
he's done and how well he's done it, He emptied Himself of all of
His divine prerogatives, and He took on the form of folks
like you and me. What condescension to become
one of us. He was in the very nature of
God, but He took on, or being in the form of God, He took on
the form of sinful flesh. Only the form of it, not the
essence of it, because He wasn't sinful. And being found in the
form of a man, what did he do? What did he do? Did he just walk
among men trying to tell them how to live? Did he tell them
how to have a happy life? It says, And being found in fashion
as a man, he became obedient to death, even the death of the cross. And he rejoiced to do it. No wonder in heaven they say,
worthy art thou, for thou hast redeemed us by thy blood out
of every kindred, tribe, tongue, and nation, and made us a kingdom
and priests unto our God. The heavens declare the glory
of God. Next time you see the sun come up, you think of the
Savior and His glory. You think of the bridegroom and
His love, and you think of the racer. the champion and his joy,
for that is our Lord, our glorious amateur Savior. Lord Jesus, thank
you for the love and the joy and the glory which are all revealed
in your work of saving us. Even now as we participate in
this ceremony that shows forth your death, may our hearts be
struck with the wonder of it. In Christ's name we pray, Amen.