First time I recall hearing that
great song, I was 17 years old, hadn't been converted long, and I'd had what I thought was
a real trial. When a baby bust his butt, he
thinks he's going through misery, you know. It was precious then and more
precious now. Turn with me, if you will, to
the Gospel of John Chapter 1. If God the Holy Spirit will enable
me, I want to preach to you the same message the first Baptist
preacher preached to those who heard him. Behold the Lamb of
God. Oh, may God give you eyes now
to behold him. Behold the Lamb of God which
taketh away the sin of the world. Now I want to show you just one
thing in this message. The Lord Jesus Christ, the Son
of the Living God, is the Lamb of God and He takes away the
sin of the world. John 1 verse 29. John was had been in Bethabara preaching
and he was a little way beyond Jordan and baptizing there those
who believed. The next day, John seeth Jesus
coming to him and saith, behold, stop whatever you're doing and
look this way, behold, the Lamb of God which taketh away the
sin of the world. This is He. This is the one I've
been telling you about. This is the one of whom the prophets
spoke. This is the one we've been looking
for. This is He of whom I said, after me cometh a man, a man,
a real man, a man which is preferred before me, indescribably more
honorable than me. But now watch this, for he was
before me. No, he wasn't. No, he wasn't. He was born after him. What's
this mean? What's this mean? He was before
me. He was before him. This man is that man who was
born in eternity, who sprang forth from the mind and purpose
of God in the covenant of grace from old eternity. This man is
he who is the God-man, our mediator. No, he had no human soul and
human body from eternity. He assumed that in time, but
he stood as the man, our God, our mediator from eternity. He's preferred before me because
he is before me. And I knew him not, but that
he should be made manifest to Israel, revealed openly. therefore
am I come baptizing with water and John by record saying I Saw
the spirit descending from heaven like a dove and it abode abode
on him Now what I'm telling you about him. I'm not reporting
to you because somebody else told me I'm telling you what
I've seen for myself verse 33 and I knew him not but he that
sent me to baptize with water and The same said to me, upon
whom thou shalt see the Spirit descending and remaining on him,
the same is he which baptizeth with the Holy Ghost, which baptizeth
in the Holy Ghost. This is he who will put you in
the life and realm of the Spirit and will put the Spirit of God
in you. And I saw and bear record, I'm
telling you what I know, that this is the Son of God. Some
translations read this way, I saw and bear record this is the chosen
of God. This is the Messiah. This is
the Christ. This is the man. This is the
son of God. This is he of whom the scriptures
speak. Again, the next day after John
stood and two of his disciples back in verse 29, he was very
publicly standing in a place, performing his work, preaching,
and now he's in private talking to just two of his disciples.
And he's talking about the same thing. And looking upon Jesus
as he walked, he walked by and he sees the Lord Jesus. He saith
to these two disciples, behold, the Lamb of God. And this is
what happened. and the two disciples heard him
speak, and they followed Jesus. Behold the Lamb of God and follow
Him. All right, I want to show you
just this one thing. Christ is the Lamb of God who takes away
the sin of the world, and I'll show it to you by making four
simple statements, the statements I prayed God will write upon
your heart and upon mine. Number one, Christ is the Lamb. And number two, Christ, the Lamb
of God, is the message of this book. And number three, being
the message of this book, Christ, the Lamb of God, is the message
of every gospel preacher. And number four, Christ, the
Lamb of God, is the revelation of the gospel. All right, let's
look at it. Number one, Christ Jesus, our
Lord, is the lamb. He is the lamb, not a lamb, not
one among many, but he is the lamb, the only sin atoning sacrifice,
the only lamb by whose death atonement could be made, the
only lamb by whose blood we have access to and acceptance with
the Father. The only Lamb whose blood being
sprinkled upon the mercy seat has obtained eternal redemption
for us. Jesus Christ is the Lamb of God. The only one there is. He's called
the Lamb of God because he is the Lamb who is of God, the Lamb
who came from God, and the Lamb who is God. I keep stressing
that. And everywhere you look in the
scriptures, you find it is continually stressed. Lindsay was dealing
with that first and great commandment this morning earlier. Hear, O
Israel, the Lord thy God is one Lord. Way back in Genesis chapter
1, with the triune God speaks and says, let us make man in
our image and after our likeness. So that throughout the scriptures,
again and again and again and again, it is emphasized that
God is three in one. And it is emphasized that God
is coming to the earth in the form of a man in humanity as
a real man. And this God man is our substitute
and savior. Were he not God, He's not our
Savior. That no one ever plant in you
any thought of a doubt concerning the absolute Godhead of Jesus
Christ the Lord. If He is not God altogether,
He is no Savior and you're yet in your sins. Religion is but
a mockery of men's souls if Jesus Christ is not God. Jesus Christ
is God, else he could not put away sin. Because he is the Lamb
who is God, he taketh away the sin of the world. He's the only
sacrifice for sin. He is the effectual sacrifice
for sin. And he is the perpetual sacrifice
for sin. I love the way the Spirit of
God inspires this message. Taketh. Taketh. Present tense. Declaring that which is the present
reality in all ages. Taketh. We recognize, we understand,
we rejoice in the fact that the whole work of salvation was accomplished
by our God for us from the foundation of the world. It was done in
eternity. Whom he did predestinate, them
he also justified. Whom he justified, them he also
glorified, and thus the scriptures speak. We were made perfect in
our Redeemer, the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.
And the work was fully accomplished when Jesus Christ died as our
substitute at Mount Calvary, crying, it is finished. But blessed
be God, it's not over. It was done. It's finished, but
it's not over. And that which was done for me
in eternity, That which was accomplished for me at Calvary is utterly
meaningless to me until it is accomplished for me in the experience
of grace. The scriptures speak like this.
Behold the Lamb of God which taketh away, which beareth away
the sin of the world. The word sin here, the word sin
is singular, not plural. Our sins are the things which
are our guilt before God. And the consequence of those
sins, what we are by nature and what we think and what we do
is the curse, which is sin. The Lamb of God who took away
our sins takes away the curse from us in the sweet experience
of grace. So that now being in Christ,
God the Holy Spirit declares in our souls, there is no condemnation
to us. He taketh away our sin. He speaks like this. He redeemeth
thy life from destruction. He justifieth the ungodly. He is near that justifies me. It is God that justify. But brother
Don, that's that's confusing. Don't you know that was all done
at Calvary? Of course, I know that. Of course,
I know that. And I know it's being done right
now. He continually justifies me in the court of conscience
by His blood. He continually redeems my life
from destruction. It is the Lamb who forgiveth
all thine iniquities, who cleanseth us from all sin, who taketh away
the sin of the world. Oh, what sweet, precious terms
of grace those are. And this Lamb, the Lord Jesus
Christ, is the universal, universal, effectual sacrifice for sin. He taketh away the sin of the
world. Now what are you going to do
with that? I'm not going to do anything with that. I'm going
to rejoice in that. He taketh away the sin of the
world. But I thought y'all believed
in limited atonement. Of course we do. Anybody who believes the
Lamb believes in limited atonement. If you don't believe in limited
atonement, you don't believe the Lamb. You don't trust Him.
You trust yourself. Well, how can you say that? He
taketh away the sin of the world. Obviously, He doesn't take away
the sins of everybody in the world. There are multitudes who
bear the curse forever in hell, from whom their sins shall never
be removed. Multitudes who bear their sins
continually, and if they bear them, the Lamb never bore them.
But He takes away all manner of sin from all manner of men
wherever they are found in all the world. He taketh away the
sin of the world. All right, that's the first thing.
Christ is the Lamb. Number two, the message of this
book is behold the Lamb of God. The message of this book, behold
the Lamb of God, children of God, behold him in the book. When you read the book of God,
You read it with no profit to your soul if you don't behold
the Lamb. Will we ever learn this? This
is not a book about religious history. It is not a book about
religious dogma. It is not a book about Baptist
or Methodist or Presbyterians or Calvinist or Armenians. It
is a book about the Lamb. That's all. That's all. And if
you miss the Lamb, you miss everything. Behold the Lamb of God. That's
the continual subject of Holy Scripture. Back in the very beginning,
in the garden, all the way through to the book of Revelation, that's
the subject. In the book of Revelation alone,
do you know how many times the Lord Jesus is mentioned, just
mentioned in that book as the Lamb? 27 times. 27 times, just to that
one book. And he is portrayed as such throughout
the book. Now, he's portrayed by many,
many types. In fact, everything God ordained
in the legal Mosaic dispensation, everything, everything God ordained,
every oracle, Every ministry, every service, every sacrifice,
every priest, every garment of the priesthood, every work of
the priest office, everything in the tabernacle, everything
in the first temple, everything in the second temple, everything
in the history of Israel, everything was designed by God and brought
to pass by God to give us a picture of Christ the Lamb. But by far,
The most imminent, clearest, most instructive picture of him
is that of the Paschal Lamb introduced in Exodus Chapter 12 when God
brought Israel out of Egypt. He said, you take a lamb, each
of you, a male of the first year. You take the lamb, set it aside
for 14 days and inspect it. Make sure it doesn't have any
spot or any blemish. And you bring the lamb and slit
its throat and take the blood of the lamb and sprinkle it on
the doorpost and the lentil. And I, when I see the blood,
will pass over you." And when they came out of Egypt, God said,
now do this every year. Do it every year. And he built
a tabernacle specifically for the purpose of Aaron having a
place to carry the blood. He carried the blood into the
tabernacle, into the holy of holies, behind the thick veil
into which no man went at any time except Aaron and he only
with the blood and he only once a year. He took the lamb, the
lamb that had been shut up for 14 days and examined without
blemish a male of the first year in the full vigor of his life.
Then he brought it before all the congregation of Israel and
he laid his hands upon the head of the lamb. by transfer in picture,
declaring the people's sins are now the Lamb's sins. And he slit
the Lamb's throat according to the requirements of Moses, God
given by Moses, that is the requirements of God's holy law. And he sacrificed
the Lamb for the people. And when the day was done, he
and Moses together, the priest, and the satisfied law together
went into the tabernacle and came out from the tabernacle
and lifted up their hands and blessed the people because of
the lamb sacrifice. That lamb was Christ, our Passover
sacrifice for us. Brother Darvey mentioned this
to you a couple of weeks ago back in Genesis chapters 3 and
4. We have a picture of this lamb. In Genesis 3, just before
expelling Adam and Eve from the garden, the Lord God himself,
that is the Lord Jesus Christ, who found Adam and Eve hiding
from him in the garden, hiding behind their little fig leaf
aprons, stripped their aprons from them, and he sacrificed
an animal. We are not told that it was a
lamb, but I'm dead sure it was. I'll show you why in a minute.
I'm dead sure it was. And when he sacrificed that innocent
victim, he took that innocent victim and made from it skins
with which he clothed Adam and Eve and covered their nakedness,
covered their shame. That's Christ our Lord. God Almighty
sacrificed his son and he comes at the appointed time of love.
and strips away your fig leaf of self-righteousness, exposes
your nakedness, and he brings the righteousness of his son
and wraps you up in it and covers your nakedness. Well, how do
you know it was a lamb? Because in Genesis chapter 4,
Adam's son Abel comes to worship God. His son Cain refused to
hear the message of grace his father proclaimed, but Abel heard
it. And when he comes to worship
God, he doesn't bring him the fruit of his own hands. He doesn't
bring him corn and beans out of his garden, but rather he
brings him a lamb, a lamb by which he comes near to God and
calls upon his name. And the Lord respected Abel and
his offering. You can read that this way. The
Lord had respect to Abel because the Lord respected his offering.
The Lord has respect to you only because he has respect to your
substitute. The Lord accepts me only because
he accepts my substitute. There is no acceptance before
God except by this lamb. In Genesis chapter 22, Abraham
and Isaac. Go up to the Mount. God required
Abraham to take his son, his only son, Isaac, whom he dearly
loved, and there sacrifice him on the Mount in a place where
he would show him. And then he said, Abraham, I want you to
think about this for three days. For three days. Isn't it amazing
how different God is from religion? Preachers everywhere. When I
was in college, They'd always tell us strike while the iron's
hot. Get folks making decisions right now. Gotta get them now.
Get them now. You build everything up in the
service to a crescendo so that you stir the emotions and get
people prepared to make a decision for Jesus and strike right now. Not God or his people. No. God says do everything you
do deliberately. with thought and purpose voluntarily. Give me your son, but you sit
down and think about it for three long days. And he never flinched. He went up to the mountain with
his son, the father and the son together. And as they're going
up the mountain, Isaac asked his father, said, father, we
got to have a lamb. And Abraham said, my son, God
will provide himself a ram for a burnt offering. And there he
was. And Abraham took that ram, turned
Isaac loose, laid that ram on the altar, and killed that ram. And he said, behold, the Lamb
of God! His name is Jehovah Jireh. This
is he. In Isaiah 53, the Lamb of God
is given a vivid picture, personified as the servant of the Lord, Jehovah's
righteous servant who assumes our flesh, who assumes our sin. All we like sheep have gone astray. We've turned aside everyone to
his own way. And the Lord hath laid on him
the iniquity of us all and dying in our place. Jehovah's servant,
the Lamb, puts away sin by the sacrifice of himself. Here in
John 129, the Baptist identifies the Lamb. He said, now, you fellas,
you know the law, and you know the prophets, you know the history
of Israel, you know all these things, you know what happened
in the garden. You know how God accepted Abel and rejected Cain,
accepted Abel's sacrifice and rejected Cain and his sacrifice?
Because Abel brought a lamb? You know how all our fathers
looked for the lamb? You know about that Paschal lamb?
You know the Passover sacrifice, day after day, offered by God,
year after year for the children of Israel? You know how they
were brought to God only by the blood of a lamb? You know the
morning and the evening sacrifice? Thousands upon thousands upon
thousands of lambs and their blood running continually like
a continual stream for 2,000 years at the altars of Israel.
You know all that? Here he is. Behold the Lamb of
God, this man who is God come in human flesh. In John 19, the
lamb is crucified. The story is told vividly by
all four gospel narratives and explained throughout the New
Testament. The Lord Jesus Christ was led up to Mount Calvary and
crucified between two thieves. And when all things were accomplished, when all things were accomplished,
that the scripture might be fulfilled. He said, I thirst. And when Jesus
had received the vinegar they put to his mouth, he cried with
a loud voice, it is finished. This puts an end to all that.
This is the period of the Old Testament sacrifices. This is
the period of the law. This is the stopping point of
legality. This is the stopping point of
the curse. This is the stopping point of
sin. It is finished because the lamb is crucified. Whenever you
look upon the crucifixion of Christ, ever remember that his
death was no accident. The Lamb of God died according
to the purpose of God, by the hand of God, at the appointed
time God had set, and He did it for the satisfying of divine
justice, for the salvation of God's elect. Now, turn if you
will to the book of Revelation. I mentioned this earlier. The Apostle John sees the result
of all this. Isaiah tells us in Isaiah 53,
11 and 12, that as the result of what he accomplished, as the
result of finishing the work, as the result of putting away
sin, as the result of redeeming his people, the Lamb shall be
glorified. And when John gets to the book
of Revelation, he sees a door open in heaven. And he sees a
throne. And he sees a bow around the
throne. And he sees by the throne, in the right hand of him that
sat on the throne, A book, a book written, sealed on the, within
and without, with seven seals. A book that no man was worthy
to open. And then he sees a lamb. A lamb who just walked right
up and took that book. Cause he has the right to take
that book. He's the one who wrote it. Revelation chapter five,
verse six. And I beheld and lo, in the midst
of the throne, and of the four beasts, and in the midst of the
elders, stood a lamb. A lamb as it had been slain,
having seven horns, perfect omnipotent power, and seven eyes, perfect
infinite wisdom, which are the seven spirits of God sent forth
into all the earth. And he came and took the book
out of the right hand of him that sat on the throne. And when
he had taken the book, the four beasts and the four and twenty
elders fell down before the Lamb, having every one of them harps
and golden vials full of odors, which are the prayers of the
saints, and they sung a new song, saying, Thou art worthy to take
the book and to open the seals thereof. How come? Where is his
worthiness? What makes him worthy to rule
everything? What gives him the glory that
he possesses? Not his eternal divinity. No,
no, that's not what's pictured here. Certainly he has all that. But this is the glory the father
gave him before the world was as the lamb slain from the foundation
of the world and the glory the father gave him when he had finished
his work upon the earth and went back to heaven. You're worthy
for this reason. Thou wast slain. But that doesn't make him worthy.
Many a man has been slain. Oh, but he was crucified. Many
a man had been crucified. That doesn't make him worthy.
No, sir. Oh, but he died as a noble sacrifice for others. That doesn't
make him worthy. Many a man has given his life
for another. What's his worthiness then? Thou
wast slain and hast redeemed. there's his worthiness. Bob,
he redeemed us. He redeemed us. He didn't make
it possible, he did it. He didn't offer it, he did it.
He didn't provide it, he did it. He redeemed us. Redeemed
us to God. By thy blood. Along with everybody
else in the world. Not on your life. Out of every
kindred and tongue and people and nation and has made us by
your redeeming blood and by your sovereign grace, kings and priests
unto God, and we shall reign on the earth. In chapter seven,
we hear the question, when all God's elect are gathered in glory,
who are these? Where'd they come from? And the
answer comes, these are they who came out of great tribulation,
who have washed their robes and made them white in the blood
of the Lamb. The Lord Jesus is described again
in the 14th chapter of the book of Revelation. I looked, and
lo, a Lamb stood on Mount Zion, and with Him were a hundred and
forty and four thousand, having His Father's name written in
their foreheads. The Lamb stood, and all His children,
all the tribes of Israel, In chapter 15, they sing the song
of Moses and the lamb. In chapter 21, the lamb is described
as the light of the city. And in chapter 22, he's the light
and the temple of the city. In other words, everything in
glory land, everything in heaven focuses on the lamb, not on dear
old mama, papa, sister, and brother, but on the lamb. Not on the Baptist
Church or the Methodist Church or the Presbyterian Church, but
on the Lamb. Not on this preacher or that,
but on the Lamb. Not on what you have earned,
but what He's earned. The Lamb's glory. Everything
focuses on Him. Number three. First, Christ is
the Lamb. Number two. Christ is the message
of this book, the Lamb of God. Behold the Lamb. And number three. The message of every gospel preacher
is the message of John the Baptist. Behold the Lamb of God, the taker
of the way, the sin of the world. John the Baptist was the first
gospel preacher in this dispensation. This is what he preached. He
preached it when he was preaching to a crowd, as we saw in verse
29. And two days later, he's talking to just a couple of fellows,
instructing them in the way of the Lord, and he sees the Lord
Jesus walk by. Preaches the same thing. Preaches
the same thing. Peter, who was the chief spokesman
to the early church and to the Jewish world, speaks of Christ
Jesus, the Lamb, who verily is fully ordained before the foundation
of the world. The Apostle Paul, the first gospel preacher to
the Gentiles, declared, I am determined to know nothing among
you, say Jesus Christ and him crucified. Indeed, the whole
church, as they went out through the world in acts, went everywhere
telling men about Jesus Christ, his death and his resurrection,
telling them about the lamb. God's servants and God's people
still go everywhere talking about the Lamb of God. A gospel preacher is a man with just one purpose,
one business, one object in life. Do you remember what that pole
was used for that Moses made in the wilderness? Do you know what its purpose
was? Well, I wonder what that pole looked like. It doesn't
matter. Wonder what it was made out of? It doesn't matter. Wonder
where he got that pole? It doesn't matter. I wonder how
he painted that pole? It doesn't matter. The only purpose
of the pole was to hold up the brazen serpent. That's all. That's all. And I
expect that pole is of such dimensions that if you tried to use it for
anything else, it'd get in your way. He held up this brazen serpent
on this long pole in the wilderness so that anybody in all the camp
of Israel could look and see the serpent. And it'd do them
no good to look on the pole. And if Moses took the pole and
tried to use it as a weapon of warfare, he'd be defeated. The pole would make him clumsy.
If he took it and tried to use it for a walking stick, if he
took it and tried to use it to build something, Just hold up
the serpent, that's all. That's what preachers are to
do. Nothing else. Just hold up Jesus Christ, the
Lamb of God, before perishing men and women and cry, behold,
the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world. John
the Baptist was born for this purpose. Sin of God for this
purpose. Everything about his life, from
his infancy to his death was arranged by God for him to cry,
behold the Lamb of God. And so it is with every man sent
of God to preach the gospel. And they're absolutely out of
place doing anything else. Would to God I could persuade
preachers to leave politics alone and leave religious ambition alone, and
leave scholarly pursuits alone, and leave making a name for themselves
alone, and leave gathering money for themselves alone, and leave
building houses for themselves alone. Leave it alone! Preach
the Lamb. That's our business. No other
business. The preacher who fails to point
to Christ as the Lamb of God, every time he stands to preach, Now, listen to me. I'm not talking
about now and then. Well, I hear folks all the time,
well, he preaches the gospel, but not like you do. I know what
that means. He don't get around to it much.
If you back him up into a corner and there's nobody listening,
you say, man, do you believe in election? Well, yeah, but
don't tell anybody. We wouldn't want that to get
out. No. That man who dares to stand before
eternity bound men and women, stand before immortal souls,
breathing on the edge of eternity, and does not proclaim Christ
the Lamb, who takes away the sin of the world, is a traitor
to the souls of men, a traitor to the glory of God, a traitor
to God himself. And he will bear the judgment
of God for it. Read Ezekiel 33. God said, their
blood will I require at your hands. Playing with men's souls is murderous
work. Sermons without Christ is playing
with men's souls. They're damning to those who
preach them and damning to those who hear them. John shows us
by example. Gospel preachers are those whose
eyes are fixed on Christ the Lamb. In verses 35 and 36, again
the next day after John stood and two of his disciples, watch
this, and looking upon Jesus as he walked. Oh Spirit of God, give me that. No matter where I walk in this
world, as I walk through this world to have the eyes of my
heart and soul fixed on Christ. If I'm going to point sinners
to Christ, I've got to be looking to Him myself. And they preach
Him best who see Him best. John, John seems to have had
no eye for anyone else. He just looked on Christ adoringly
as one astonished by him, lovingly as one ravished by him, constantly
as one who had no interest except him. Tell you what, try. Tell you
what, try. First time you're on a busy street,
on a busy street, if you want to have a little fun, just do
this. I'll give you five minutes. You'll
have 50 people standing around you doing this. What's he looking at? Let me
tell you. Focus your heart on the son of
God. And when you tell folks about
him, your words will have meaning. But if your heart's not focused
on him, The preacher can preach all he
wants to and his words have no meaning. This lamb of God, John points
to as he who taketh away the sin of the world. That's the preacher's message.
And this is the revelation of the gospel. The gospel of God
declares Christ, the Lamb of God, takes away sin completely and entirely forever. Behold Him. When your conscience preaches
you, behold the Lamb of God. When Satan would assault you
with your own sin, behold the Lamb of God. When you're cast
down because you know your inward corruptions, behold the Lamb
of God. When trouble comes, behold the
Lamb of God. That's what faith is. It is looking
to the Lamb of God. You who stand here today, sit
here before me, dead in trespasses and in sins. I bid you in the
name of God, behold the Lamb of God. And if you can, oh, if you can,
if right now you can look to him as Aaron did in the typical
ceremonies, And as every man did in those typical ceremonies,
lay your hand of faith where God laid the sins of his
people on Christ the Lamb. My faith doth lay her hand on
that dear head of thine. Lay your hand of faith on Christ
the Lamb. And confess your sin. Confess
your sin. And I make you this absolute
declaration, without the least hesitancy, the Lamb has taken
away your sin. Christ died for you. Christ died
for you. Oh, but preacher, my faith is
so feeble, mine too. But I just, I can't seem to trust
Him like I ought to. Would to God, Larry, I could,
but I can't. But trust Him, I do. And with a voluntary heart, willingly,
I bring to God that which God in His holy law requires, a perfect
sacrifice. of infinite worth, the Lamb,
who was made sin, and suffered all the wrath of God, till justice
was fully satisfied, and makes me the righteousness of God in
Him. Amen.