1 Corinthians chapter 2 and verse
number 2. We have the Apostle Paul and
he makes this statement, and he's given what is preached to
them before in this statement. He says, I am determined not
to know anything among you, save Jesus Christ and Him crucified. There was a contention among
the Corinthians. And look at verse 1, he says,
And I, brethren, right before that, he says, according as it
is written, he that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord. And
I, brethren, when I came to you, came not with excellency of speech
or of wisdom declaring unto you the testimony of God." So he
didn't come with that of excellency of speech, but he just declared
the very testimony of God. And, you know, when one comes
in man's wisdom, that distracts from the Word of God and the that of the piercing effect of
the Word of God, the Spirit takes the Word of God and applies it
to the heart. Carnal wisdom may charm that
of the ear, but it's the Spirit that reaches the heart. So we
find Paul, he is determined that everything be to the glory of
God, and the very gospel is to his glory. Then he gives us the
doctrine that is found here in verse 2 of the crucified Christ,
the crucified Savior. And he says before us the cross
and the crucifixion. He says, I am determined, or
I determine, and that is not to know anything among you. He
says, I am judging that this is most profitable. that this is profitable and most
profitable unto you. He says, I know not to know anything
among you, all the traditions, see some of them held to traditions.
And he says it's Christ. Others held to the philosophy
of the world. It's Christ. And that day they
had the poets that would give them religion and so forth. He
says it's Christ. It's not these things. It's Jesus
Christ in Him crucified. It's the deity of Christ. It's
His person. It's His glory. And the Gospel
gives us the riches of it all. And we see Paul is taken up with
one thing. He's taken up with the Lord Jesus
Christ. not to know anything save Jesus
Christ. Who has he taken up with? It's
Christ Jesus, isn't it? Christ and His death. And that's
the choice's subject for that of the ear. We find, as we would
study this, and again, this is a study of Christ and Him crucified. We just study Him. There has
to be a knowledge of Him. We find over here in 1 Corinthians
In verse 18 it says, "...the preaching of the cross is to
them that perish foolishness, but unto us which are saved is
the power of God." It's the very power of God. Now let's look
at His death in a few minutes this morning, some things about
it. Turn with me over to the book
of Acts. Just turn back a little bit to the book of Acts. In chapter
number 2, And verse number 23, as we start
out, we'll see something about it right here. Acts 2 and 23. His death was ordered. It was decreed. Look at it. Him being delivered by the determinate
counsel and foreknowledge of God. Here's Christ crucified.
And it says he was delivered by the determined counsel and
foreknowledge of God. It was decreed in heaven, wasn't
it? It's been decreed. It was decreed. Then he also
puts the responsibility upon man. He says, you have taken
by wicked hands, have crucified and slain. So here's two aspects
of it. Men did what they wanted to do. They were guilty of what they
did. But yet we see that it's by the determined counsel of
God, isn't it? It's the creed of God. It was
something that was promised in the Scripture as Adam failed. We find that the sacrifices,
God instituted the sacrifices, and this is a picture of redemption.
And these believers in the Old Testament, they looked toward
Christ's crucifixion, This typified in the Old Testament the sacrifices
to Christ's death, to His crucifixion, and the merits of Christ's death
was applied unto them even though it had not happened. Just as
it's applied to us after it happened, it was applied to them before
it happened. The Bible tells us over in 2
Corinthians, in chapter 5, it says there he was made sin. God had made him sin for us. Made him. Not by us, but God
has done this. And we find what he performed. Here's his crucifixion. And what
he performed, it was for us. It was accepted to the Father
for us. It's applied by the Spirit to
us. And we know that God is sovereign
in all that He does, and He chose to do this out of His wisdom.
Here's the way that He chose for redemption. So, in His sovereignty,
He set up the Son. to be a sacrifice, set him up
to be a surety, set him up to be a redeemer, and he gave him
this work to do. Now, it was an act of love. If
we read the Scriptures and study the Scriptures and study the
crucifixion, you see love. That's what it is. Herein is
love, the Scripture says. So God the Creator, as He beheld
man, and He made man in His own image, the Scripture says, and
He made him. He gave him graces. He had a
holiness about him out of dead. He was upright. But man chose
to rebel against God. And yet, in that rebellion, we
see God's grace. We see His mercy. We see His
goodness. Look at all the privileges that
He had given to Adam. Adam walked with God, didn't
he? He had all of these privileges. But yet, we find that he ruined
himself. We find the misery that he partook
in because of sin. and Adam and Eve was not able
to recover themselves. We find that they hid themselves. They covered themselves with
the fig leaves. They did all of these things.
They were not able to recover themselves. Look at even their will. They
would not come to God. They tried to make excuses, Adam
did, and he just added to that of his crime and to his rebellion. But we see God in His great love
and His grace, He sent a way of recovery, and we find that's
what the cross is. We find rather than Adam to perish,
and he should perish for that of his sins, we see God would
transfer that punishment unto a victim, didn't He? Isn't that
a picture of Christ in the crucifixion? There is one equal to God Himself,
the Lord Jesus Christ. He was the most beloved. He was
God's delight. He was dearer than anything in
heaven or earth, Christ. No wonder John says, herein is
love. He sent his Son to be a propitiation. for us, for sin, to be a propitiation,
to appease the very wrath of God. So we see that it was love
that restored man after the fall, and there's no reason but love.
God didn't have to do this. We find that angels sinned and
they were left to the state that they plunged themselves into. But here is grace. And we find
that God would punish His own Son. Here is the grace and mercy
and goodness of God. We also find when we look at
Christ's crucifixion and act of justice. Christ came out of
love. He came to honor the Father.
He willingly undertook this upon Himself. He put Himself between
us and divine wrath. That's what the mediator did.
He put Himself. And that's what Christ did. He stood in our stead, the Bible
says, to buy our sins. This was an act of justice and
here is God the law giver. Here is God the judge and He
demand punishment for the transgression of man. We read over in the book
of Isaiah that God has laid upon Him the iniquity of us all. He
laid it upon Christ Jesus. He took the punishment Himself.
And as the Scripture says, to bow our sins in His own body
upon the tree, He became responsible for our transgression. Yet He
never sinned. Christ had never sinned. But
He stood as our surety. He stood in our stead. And He
put Himself, when we look at the cross and look at Him crucified,
we're looking at this, He put Himself in the way of punishment.
What was due us was laid upon Him, and the surety paid the
price. Our sins, the Bible says, is
imputed unto Him. We find that He emptied Himself.
He left heaven's glory. He came to this earth. He was
Lord of angels, but yet He took the nature of a servant. And He went to the cross and
shed His blood. Christ crucified, humbled Himself. Now, He's greater than heaven
itself. He's the greatest of all. But
yet He went to the cross, didn't He? There's His willingness to
suffer. He consented to it and he accomplished
that that he needed to accomplish. He wasn't driven. He voluntarily, the scripture
says, he went to the cross. He willingly took the cup that
was put before him. As a lamb, it talks about before
his sure is done, there's Christ. as He willingly underwent this.
The greatness of His suffering, the bitterness that was associated
with the cross. We find in the New Testament
time that the cross was that which was for the male factors
and those that had committed great crimes. It was for the
slaves and male factors. The most despicable of characters. Just think about the shame. of
the Lord Jesus Christ being upon the cross for those who said
they're not fit to live in the world. Here's Christ, perfect,
the very Lamb of God, spotless, pure, holy upon the cross. What shame! They even spat upon Him. We know
it was cruel. One of the most cruel ways of
putting one to death We see him being scourged by Pilate. It's
called a cursed death in the Scriptures. The Bible says he
was made a curse for us. I think the greatest of all of
his suffering was when there was that black cloud between
God and him. He says, My God, my God, why
has thou forsaken me? Would that be the greatest of
all his suffering? So, he preached Christ crucified. Now, I want to turn and talk
about the fruits of his death. The outcome of it. The accomplishment
of it. And that's what Paul would include
in this as he talked about Christ crucified. He would say the results
of it. The outcome of it. One is that
it appeased the very wrath of God for us. Now this is the only
way that the wrath of God can be appeased. Now wouldn't that
be great fruit this morning and important fruit that God's wrath
would be appeased toward us? There's God in His threatening
and God as He threatened against sin and He must carry out His
Word. Didn't the Bible say, he that
sinneth shall die? Isn't death associated with sin? It is. And there's God's Word
and He had to carry it out, didn't He? He never turns from His Word. So we find that Christ took God's
wrath in our very place. Here's a merciful God and one
that would pity us, but He would not let sin go unpunished. Here's
a holy God that hates sin, but here's that of His wrath being
appeased by the death of the Redeemer, the Lord Jesus Christ. And the cross is called reconciliation. It's reconciliation to those
that believe, to the believers. The cross brings us to God. We
can be friends to God. Through the cross, can't we?
Through Christ's crucifixion. That's the fruit of it. The crucified
Redeemer alone is able to affect this cross. Him and his nature,
that design in human nature. No creature or angel was able
to do this. There was too weak for this. But Christ frees us. Justice
is come. Can you see it this morning,
what Christ has done? The crucifixion. That the fruit
of it is, that the wrath of God is turned away. It came up, Ephesians
says, it came up before God as a sweet savor. That of a sweet
smell before the very nostrils of God. And that goes back to
the Old Testament and the savor that was used there. He fully
pleased God. Christ did. And now there's pardon
of sins. There's pardons of sin to the
believer and he's justified. And we see God's justice and
His holiness that this glorified, the honor of the law is preserved. We find also that Christ, His
crucifixion, quenched the flames against us, didn't it? Isn't
that what it does? The wrath. Oh, our sins is put
away by the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. He secured us from
the very sword of wrath. The divine vengeance upon sin
by taking it upon Himself. That was the fruit of it. Then
also, here again, is the fruit of Christ's crucifixion is that
it silenced the law. You know, the law thunders out
and it says, do, do. Man, by his nature, could not
keep the law of God. It says, do, and he cannot. He cannot do. He cannot be perfect. The law calls for perfection.
It thunders out. Do this! Do this! So He redeemed us this morning
from the curse of the law. The Bible says there is no condemnation
to those that are in Christ. And the Bible goes on and says
we are dead to the law. Now what can the law do to the
one that is dead? It says we are dead to it. It
has no condemning power. What the law did was it sentenced
us to death because of sin. It sentenced us. But here we
find Christ took that sentence upon Himself. Christ died. And we find He fulfilled the
penalty of the law. In His life, He fulfilled the
law by His obedience. And as He stood, He was a substitute
for us. You know, as we study the crucifixion,
it stands out to us the substitutionary atonement of the Lord Jesus Christ. How He was substituted in our
place and what did He do? He silenced the law against us. The law that stood against us,
that thundered against us, They said, do, and we've not done.
The law that says do, and we broke. Here is Christ, and He
silenced that law. It even goes further than that.
He's removed our guilt. God the Judge is now satisfied. God the Judge is appeased. The
law has been cancelled out and there has been a removal of guilt.
We have the forgiveness of sin. Or in the book of Ephesians,
it talks about our forgiveness through the blood of the Lord
Jesus Christ. And there is no creditor now
in pursuit of us. See, we look and we say, Christ
is paid. Here is the crucifixion. He is
paid. There is no creditor coming after
debt anymore. And we were debtors. But we had
nothing to pay. We were bankrupt as debtors,
wasn't we? Bankrupt. We didn't have any
pay. Couldn't pay. And we see that in Christ it's
all paid. It's canceled. They used to have,
in the Bible days, they'd take a debt, they would put a nail
in it and pin it to the wall. And that's why it says He's nailed
our sins to the cross. That's what He was doing, castling
our very dead. So the justice of God, we find
that Christ has paid it before the
justice of God. And He didn't require a double
payment. It's not that Christ paid and
man's going to pay, but Christ paid and man's free. I detest
anything that says there's going to be a double payment. God's
justice never demands double payment. It's Christ. And if He's paid for our sins,
He's paid for our sins. We find that Christ, the Bible
says, He bore our penalty. And because He bore our penalty,
we're acquitted of the debts. There's a sin nature that we
have. There's the sin of our person
also. There's many offenses, but his
death is under justification. And again, you find the figure
of the Old Testament, the scapegoat, in which they would take and
confess the sins upon that goat and send it out into wilderness
never to be seen again. That's a picture of what we're
talking about here. The fruit of the crucifixion
is that our guilt is removed. It's been sent away. The crucifying
Christ is worth knowing, as Paul says to us here, to know Him. Determined not to know anything
else. Isn't that worth knowing this morning? Isn't that the
thing that's worth knowing in this world today? It's Christ's
crucifixion. Knowing it as it applies to us
and our very hearts and our lives. The Bible tells us He's obtained
an eternal redemption for us. The Bible says He's given His
life as a ransom for us, His blood as a ransom for us. Now
another fruit this morning of this crucified Christ is this,
that He brews Satan's head. Isn't that worth knowing this
morning? That's another thing this morning to this knowledge.
Christ crucified that old serpent. He's bruised his head. That's
what Christ's crucifixion has done. And that was promised in
the Scripture. And here the Bible says the accuser
is cast out, destroying him that has the power of death. The cross
disarms him. There's a victory over Satan,
the cross. You know, they looked at it and
those that didn't have eyes to see, those that didn't have spiritual
eyes to see, it looked like just one being put to death. But the
Bible sets it forth as victory. The Bible sets it forth as destroying
the works of the devil. You know, the devil's empire
was reared up because of the learning of man by sin. And now sin is put away by Christ. And we find that the punishment
is no longer because that it's been put away by Christ. The
authority of Satan is taken away. You see, that's something worth
knowing this morning, knowing the crucifixion of Christ, that
here, that He takes away the venom of the serpent. Then He
broke His power, darkness. He's vanquished by His blood. There's a conquering effect by
Christ's Spirit. That's another fruit this morning,
the bruising of Satan's head. Then another fruit this morning
is that we're washed. We're washed Christ came by water
and blood, the Scripture says. There He came by blood to put
away our sins and by water to purify our souls. You remember
when they pierced Him, blood and water came out, didn't it?
There is the water for washing, the blood to put away our sins,
remove our spots, Our pollution. See, this has to be removed before
we can go to the throne of God. Before we can come before Him,
our pollution has to be removed. We have to be washed. And again, that's the effect
of the cross. Now, we have access to the throne. And the Bible
says we can come boldly to the throne. His death is to purify. Gives us new life, a new nature. It brings us into communion with
God. And His death, the Bible says,
is made under sanctification. That is, we're set apart by His
death. Isn't that something worth knowing
today? Christ's crucifixion that we're
washed by, we're cleansed by, Another fruit here is that He
opens heaven for us. See, that's a better place. Adam
lived in paradise. It was called paradise. But heaven
is better than paradise, isn't it? We find that by the law of sin,
man is reduced to dust. The Bible says, dust is made
out of dust he goes back to. But Christ purchased the redemption
of the body. He redeemed the body. And that's
going to be evidenced in the resurrection. See, here again,
He opens heaven for us. He's purchased eternal life.
The Bible says to be with Him. Be with Him is heaven. See, we lost paradise with sin,
but we gain heaven by the cross. We gain heaven by the crucifixion
of the Lord Jesus Christ. Ours is the fruit from His death.
Now what's before us this morning is that we ought to be thankful
for a crucified Redeemer. Isn't this most amazing this
morning, of that it's all in heaven and earth, that here's
the crucified Redeemer, and the love that's due God because of
Christ's crucifixion. The love that is due Christ this
morning because of the crucifixion. That God gave us His Son, and
He not only gave Him to live for us, but He gave Him to die
for us. Such a shameful and a cursed
death. We are to love Christ, who is
our surety, that He paid the whole sum. He paid it all. Who was numbered among the transgressors. He was numbered there that we
might be among the blessed. Oh, this morning, we look at
Him, He trod the winepress alone. The Bible says the cup and that
which was in the cup, the cup of His suffering, said He drank
the very dregs out of it. It was all because of love. So
His death this morning is The grams for the good that has come
to us. The grace that has come to us.
This morning, don't talk about grace outside of the crucifixion
of the Lord Jesus Christ. Don't talk about grace outside
of Christ. So, His death. You know, if He hadn't suffered,
we'd have no fruits of the cross, wouldn't we? Those fruits that
we've talked about, we wouldn't have those this morning. If He
wasn't a crucified Savior, we'd be rejected forever outside
of the cross. We'd be rejected from the throne
of God. Over in Ephesians it says we
have access by Christ. Is Him crucified? We have access
to the throne. Salvation would never have been
if it wasn't for Christ's crucifixion this morning. Salvation would
have never been. But by the cross, God is pleased. God, this morning, by the cross,
salvation and blessings come to us today by the cross. Without the cross, would man
have been happy and happy forever? Save our happiness forever? Without
the cross, God is displeased. Without the cross this morning,
man is at enmity against God. Without the cross? Without the cross, man will never
see Him or have access to Him. See, the Lord Jesus Christ, He
performed many things in His life as He walked upon the face
of the earth. He performed miracles. Look at
all the miracles that He did. Look at all the kindness that
He did. But the cross, we find there,
as He hung there, is the difference. He did that to affect our deliverance. What if He had just done miracles
this morning, and weren't miracles? We needed the cross, didn't we?
We needed a crucified Savior. What if He just walked on the
earth and we know He performed all this kindness and compassion? But yet, we needed a cross. We
needed a crucifixion. And it was a cost to Him. What
love when we see the cross. Oh, this morning, this knowledge
and delight and knowledge of Christ's crucifixion, it ought
to be in our thoughts and our very study of Christ crucified,
Him living, but also dying, to know Him. That's the great object
of faith, to know Christ and Him crucified. There is the belief
of the cross and the redemption that is wrought. If He just lived,
He would not have been our Savior if all that He did was come to
this earth. But faith, we see Him not only
living, but we see Him dying. We see Him shedding His blood
for us. Oh, this morning, those miracles
that He wrought and so forth, there had to be the very cross.
And without the cross and the crucifixion, we'd be God's enemies
forever. Satan would have been the executioner. Without the cross, we'd have
had to bear our own punishment for sin. It had been upon ourselves. Without the cross this morning,
there'd be no heaven. Without the cross, there'd be
no reconciliation. But we see His death has redeemed
us and bought us. Every blessing that we have comes
to us by Christ and it comes to us through the crucifixion
of Christ. That's how it comes to us. This
morning to look at the cross. Lord, bring repentance to our
very hearts as we see Him. Bring sorrowful sin. We see what
sin caused Him and our sin caused Him. Our sins caused Him to suffer. The Lord unveiled us this morning. And we know that our sins are
against the very compassion of God and Christ. And we look at it this morning
as to bring repentance to us. We also see this. We see the
blood confirming that everlasting covenant. Faith sees the mercy of God. And it's a great assurance of
the promises of God. We see that God gave Christ,
shall He not with Christ give us all things the scripture says? Doesn't that enhance faith this
morning as it looks at Christ and sees Him as a crucified one? If God's done this for us and
given Him, shall He not give us the lesser things? This morning
it gives us boldness and confidence in coming to God. You may come
in Christ. You're invited to come in Christ. You're welcome in Christ. And
old Pearson, I read this many, many years ago. He says, when
you go to God, take Christ in your arms. Take the crucified Christ. His death. Through the crucified
Christ, the throne is open to us. God hears us. This has been why He hears us.
Would He have heard us if it wasn't for the crucified Christ? But now He has the ear to hear
us. And it's all the cross of the cross. This morning this
brings comfort to us. And it's the foundation for our
comfort, the cross is. That Christ is a surety. That
we are crucified in Him. We live in Him. We died in Him. We're buried in Him. We're resurrected
in Him. This morning, it brings comfort
that He bore our sins away. He put them away by His death.
This morning, we know that we're accepted in the Beloved. In the
Crucified Christ, we're accepted. It's not man or angels that we're
accepted, but it's the Crucified Christ. Do you see this morning
the knowledge of Him, how important that it is? that is our comfort,
that is our peace. Could you have real, lasting,
true peace without this knowledge today, a knowledge of Christ
crucified, a knowledge that His blood blots out our various sins,
a knowledge of Christ, how important that it is. As we look at it
today, you see, and we see the horror,
if one would see the wrath of God. It's like one, if he saw
in the old west days, and we see these westerns, and they've
got one, and he's in the jail, and he's looking out there, and
they're building the gallows for him. Wouldn't that be terrible? But oh, to see that our sins
are put away. That propitiation is made, appeasement
has been made. God's anger is turned away. That
the law is satisfied. There's no condemnation. That
would bring a calm, wouldn't it? And a comfort. Oh, see what it is to look to
the crucified Christ. What His suffering has done.
what is death, how it disarmed the very law of God, and how
His blood washes us from our sins. How His death bears destruction
to our enemies. And we owe it this morning. And
the Apostle here, this is a testimony of divine love. And the Apostle
says, to know nothing this morning among you save Jesus Christ and
Him crucified. What is all the other knowledge
without this knowledge? What is all the other understanding
without this understanding of Christ crucified? May we ponder
this and study this. It's chief among Paul, wasn't
it? It's chief among him. He said,
I consider this profitable to you. All this other, don't worry
about it. But here's that which is profitable
unto you. It's profitable. I am determined
not to know anything among you save Jesus Christ and Him crucified. What an important knowledge. is Christ in Him crucified. Our Father, take the message. We know that His feeble lips
wear clay, but we know by Thy Spirit that You can take this
message and apply it to our hearts. Oh, the fruit of His death. Blessings has come to us. Oh, what a blessing to have our
sins put away. Oh, to be cleansed from our sins. We thank you and we praise you.
Bless those who sat before us and those who hear this message.
Bless them, we pray in Christ's name. Amen.