I invite you to turn back with
me, if you will, to the 53rd chapter of the book of Isaiah. I'd like to read the 6th verse
this morning for a text. All we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned everyone to his
own way, and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all."
I recognize, as I stand before you this morning, that we're
probably all at different stages of growth in the faith of the
Lord Jesus Christ. I recognize that there are some
that are reaching maturity of faith, and there are others who
babes in Christ, and there's an area in between that is quite
a vast area. And then also I'm conscious that
there are those in our midst that are strangers to the grace
of God and they're outside of Christ, they have not been brought
into the fold, their sins have not yet been forgiven, and we're
conscious of that. And we try to speak in such a
manner that we might be of help and be a source or an instrument
in the hands of God to the accomplishment of his purpose both in the lost
sheep, the lives of the lost sheep, and also in the lives
of those that have already been brought into the fold and whose
sins have been pardoned and put away. And so I hope this morning
as we speak that God will be pleased to make application to
your heart in whatever situation you find yourself, wherever you
might be, whether you be in Christ, out of Christ, whether you be
mature in the faith or very weak in the faith or whether you're
coming along as you ought to be at this time that the Lord
will make application of his word to your heart. This verse
of scripture here on the surface appears to be a very simple verse
of scripture and one which maybe each one of you would be able
to talk a little bit about. But I want to this morning if
I can to give you those things that And the Lord is impressed
upon my mind and I believe it will be a benefit to every one
of us. Might we love the Lord Jesus
more after this service today. In verse 6 we read, all we like
sheep have gone astray, we have turned everyone to his own way. We've all like sheep gone astray,
we have turned everyone to his own way. Now since the fall in
the Garden of Eden, man has done some truly senseless things. It's amazing the effect of the
fall. I'm sure this morning that we
cannot begin to estimate or to proclaim the many, many senseless
things that have happened in God's world since the fall in
the Garden of Eden. But there are four things that
I want to mention to you at the outset this morning, four things
that man has done since the fall that have been absolutely senseless,
that have demonstrated that truly man did have a fall in the Garden
of Eden, that we all like sheep have gone astray, and that we've
turned everyone to his own way. Now the first thing I'd like
to mention is this, is that man has placed the world and the
things of this world ahead of God and ahead of the things of
God. Man has placed the things of
this world ahead of God and ahead of the things of God. Now beloved,
rather than love the Lord of glory, in whom we live and move
and have our being, man is in love with himself and he's in
love with everything that is opposed to God Almighty. He's in love, he loves the pleasures
of the world and he loves the things of this world and his
love is not directed in the direction that it ought to be. This is
a senseless thing but it's a product of the fall in the garden. Instead
of loving Christ with all of his heart mind and his soul and
his strength. He loves the world with all of
his heart, soul, mind, and strength. Man is by nature a friend of
the world, and he is anti-God, and he is anti-Christ. I recognize
that there's some that might be offended, with some of the
things that I have to say this morning. But beloved, you ought
not be offended at this doctrine because it's taught all through
the Word of God. It's plainly taught that we all,
like sheep, have gone astray. It's plainly taught that we're
all sinners by nature and that we all have chosen sin rather
than the way of righteousness. Now we've become the very enemies
of God. Man is by nature at enmity with
God. It's his nature, if he could
do so, he'd stick a butcher knife in the heart of God and cast
him down from the throne because man has put himself and has put
the world and the things of this world ahead of the Lord God Almighty. And then also he has placed himself
before God's Christ. He's placed himself before the
Redeemer, and through the Scriptures it teaches us to glory only in
the Lord. We're taught in the Word of God
that if we're going to glory, then we ought to glory in the
Lord. But yet every man is an idolater
because every man has set himself up and to be more important than
God's Christ, than the Lord Jesus Christ himself. He loves and
he worships and he lives for his own glory. Now, you may say,
well, I just don't know whether I worship myself or not. But
Beloved, if we could really this morning run tests in a spiritual
way and of a spiritual nature on you, it would be discovered
that you are an idolater, that you are a self-worshipper, that
is, man in his original, that is, man in his fallen state.
That is, man, in the nature that was passed on to him by and through
generation by his parents, this nature, this fallen nature, man
is an idolater and he loves and he worships and he lives for
his own glory. Now the old confessions of faith
used to start off with the question, what is the chief end of man? What is the chief end of man? And the answer was to glorify
God and to enjoy him forever. That is the chief end of man. But man will not glory in the
Lord, but he glories rather in himself. He focuses his attention
and gives his praise unto himself and unto those things that he's
able to accomplish through the labor of his own hands. We've
turned everyone to his own way, says the text. And then thirdly,
I believe that man has placed the body before the soul. And
this is a truly senseless thing, because we know that man's soul
is an ever-dying soul, and we know that man has been created
by God to live eternally, and that man will live for all eternity. Man's soul is going to live on
and on and on throughout the ages of eternity. But beloved,
listen, great care is given and is taken to clothe the body,
but no thought is given among natural man or among the men
of this world concerning their shameful souls and their need
to have a garment which God will accept And that garment is the
righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ. We're mightily concerned
about our dress, about how we dress and how we appear in public
and all of that. And great amounts of money is
spent on men and women being properly attired. But we're not
concerned about our soul as it stands before God and we desperately
are in need of a garment A garment by which we can appear before
God, and this garment is the righteousness of the Lord Jesus
Christ. Yet we're not concerned about
that. And that's evidence of the fact that we have been affected
by the fall. Now, God, this morning, I'm sure
would have us to be concerned about clothing. He would have
us to be concerned about food and drink. And these things are
vital to us. Yet Christ, the true bread which
came down from heaven, Christ who is the water of life for
thirsty, perishing sinners, is of no value to the common man. He's of no value to the ordinary
citizen. on the straight. Jesus Christ
does not count. It's what I'm going to eat, it's
what I'm going to drink, it's what I'm going to wear. We have
placed the body and its needs before the needs of our never-dying
soul. Is this not true? Well, beloved,
that's exactly what the writer here Isaiah had in mind when
he said we've turned everyone to his own way and we've all
like sheep, we've gone astray. And then physical health. Oh
my, the many, many dollars and the great concern that's spent
attending to our physical health. Now, but yet the soul of man,
it continues while it is desperately sick. It's incurably ill as far
as man is concerned. We're not doing anything about
that. We don't seem to be concerned about that. We don't seem to
be addressing the great matters of the soul, the soul which God
has put within us that's going to live on somewhere for all
eternity. Now a comfortable home is a must
for these dying bodies. Every one of us, you know, we've
got to have a comfortable place to live, but there's no thought
given whatsoever to an everlasting shelter this morning for the
home of our soul. There's nothing, oh, we see very
little attention given to it, very little thought expressed
in that direction. It's all we just got to have
this here in this world. And beloved, it's terrible that
we neglect the soul, because what shall man give in exchange
for his soul? Now truly, then, the text speaks
the truth. We all, like sheep, have gone
astray. Now the fourth thing that I'd
like to mention is this. And man has placed, I think,
time before eternity. He's placed time before eternity. Time, which is, well the scripture
says, that what is your life? It's even as a vapor that just
appears for a little time and then it just vanishes away. Just for a little time. And then
we know that man, that his days are few. There are few in this
world. Few and full of trouble, as Jacob
said. And we know that time, beloved, we measure, we think
it's, well, we think it's long, but really time is very, very
short compared with eternity. Yet we have placed time before
eternity. We're all inherently preoccupied
preoccupied with this life, and we disregard that eternity which
is yet to come, and we live just simply for the here and the now. We just live for now. We're not
concerned about heaven and laying up treasures in heaven. Man by
nature is no concern for that. He has no concern. He don't even
want to talk about death, and he don't want to talk about going...
A lot of people don't even want to go to a funeral. They don't
want to go to a funeral home because they're so preoccupied
with this life and with time that they don't want to give
any thought, they don't want to be reminded of the solemn things
of eternity. But now, beloved, we'll associate
ourselves with the church of what's happening now. That's
the idea. We're concerned about this life. We don't want anything to do.
Listen, we don't want to know about how it was and we don't
want to know about how it's going to be by and by. We're interested
in the church of what's happening now. We don't want to be bothered
about anything to do with the past or the future. It's all
right now. And the news used to be that
we would hear on the television and other places. It used to
be about yesterday. The news was about yesterday,
but now we're told that we have a ringside seat to whatever's
going on anywhere in the world. It's what's happening now. That's
what we're interested in. Oh, that's old news. We don't
worry about that. Tell us about what's happening
right now. Take us right to it. And you know, we've seen in the
last few days, a week or so, we've seen an example of that.
How that we've been bombarded by everything that's happening
instantaneously all over the world, especially in the war
zone in the Middle East. And it's come home to me that
we're placing time before eternity. Now, beloved, that's what this
is. And we live for the here and
now and forget that this life is but the vestibule for the
vastness of eternity. We forget that, and we're not
mindful of it. We'd somehow rather ignore that,
that this life is only the vestibule for the vastness of eternity.
And I hope that these things that we've told you this morning,
that this helps you to see how that we all, like sheep, have
gone astray and how that we've turned everyone to our own ways. Now, friends of mine this morning,
brothers and sisters in Christ, There are three gospel truths
that I find set forth in this verse of Scripture this morning
that I believe that every child of God, everyone who's been regenerated
by the Divine Spirit, saved, called by the effectual call
of Almighty Grace, has experienced, believed, and will confess. Will confess and listen to me
this morning regarding these three points of doctrine that
I want to give you this morning. I Recognize that some people
say well, we don't want to hear doctrine. We just don't we're
not interested in hearing doctrine But you do you understand that
doctrine is just simply teaching. That's all it is It's teaching
and I hope this morning that you might follow as I give you
these three foundational doctrines that I find in this verse of
scripture here that all of the true people of God most surely
believe. They believe it, they've experienced
it, and they confess to these three points of doctrine. Now
I'm going to give you two And I'm not going to speak very long
on them, but the third point I'm going to talk quite a bit
about, and I'll use the most of my time on the last point. But the first point that I see
here and that is revealed and that you will confess to if you
be a child of God, you've experienced it, And you know what I'm talking
about this morning, and that is original sin, the doctrine
of original sin. All we like sheep have gone astray. We all went astray from God in
the sin and the fall of our father Adam, who was our federal representative
in the garden. And we read in Psalm 14 and verse
3 that they're all gone aside, they're all together become filthy. There is none that doeth good,
no, not one. The doctrine of original sin. Romans 5 and 12 says, Wherefore,
as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin,
and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sin. Now I'm talking about original
sin because it was the first sin of our race and it's the
source and it's the cause of all other sin. I say it was the
first sin and it's the cause and source of all other sin. By God's appointment and decree,
it was no accident, it wasn't something that just happened,
Adam became the federal head and representative of all men. In the Garden of Eden, he was
there, placed there by God to be the federal head and representative
of all men. And his sin was imputed to all
men. Adam sinned in the Garden. His
sin was imputed or accredited to all men so that all men became
sinners by his disobedience. Romans 5 verse 18 and 19 we read
therefore as by the offense of one Judgment came upon all men
unto condemnation That's half of the verse and the next part
is even so by the righteousness of God of one, the free gift
came unto justification of life. And then in verse 19, for as
by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the
obedience of one shall many be made righteous. And what those
verses are teaching is that through this one man, who was our federal
head and representative placed in the Garden of Eden by God
himself, that through his fall we all have become sinners. When
Adam did what he did, we did too because we were in Adam and
we all became sinners by Adam's fall in the garden. And furthermore,
Adam's fall and his depraved nature is imparted to all men
by natural generation. Every one of us, we've all been
made partakers of it. all down through the generations
of men in the world. And in Psalm 51 in verse 5, David
said, Behold, I was shaken in iniquity, and in sin did my mother
conceive me. And so this is a doctrine that
we confess, it's a doctrine that we've experienced, it's a doctrine
that we believe, and so therefore we've set it forth to you this
morning. the doctrine of original sin. That's where you got into
the trouble that you're in. And all of the trouble that you
have this morning that has to do with sorrow, affliction, all
of the trouble that you have to do with sin and fault and
failure in your life, it all originated from right here, what
I'm talking about, the doctrine of original sin. All the blackness,
the darkness, the heaviness, of the loathe that has fallen
upon man because he rebelled against God and sinned in the
Garden of Eden and passed upon all those that would come into
the world this awful, this wicked, this sinful, this nature that
we're about to talk about a little more. Now the second gospel truth
which we want to touch upon which is most surely experienced and
believed and confessed by the people of God is personal depravity. personal depravity. We are all
sinners by imputation, birth, and nature, but we are all sinners
also by personal choice. By personal choice. We have turned
everyone to his own way. Now in Psalm 58 verse 3, it says,
The wicked are estranged from the womb. They go astray as soon
as they be born, speaking lies. Now, beloved, that is a true
testimony. Did you get that? The wicked
are estranged from the womb. They go astray as soon as they
be born, speaking lies. And in Jeremiah 17 and verse
9, it says, The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately
wicked. Who can know it? Now, the elect
of God, those chosen by God the Father and given to the Son in
the eternal love gift before the foundation of the world,
are like all other men by nature. Every one of them, they went
astray from God. Each one turns to his own way,
but never to the Christ. the way until he is turned to
the way of God by almighty grace. Beloved, personal depravity.
You say, why do men continue in rebellion? Well, some men,
listen to me, they go in the way of open sin and rebellion. Those who live in sin, sin all
the time, It's their trade and they work hard at it. They're
greedy and they're full of iniquity and they work hard at this and
never for a moment do they turn, as it were, from anything else.
They sin without cessation because it's their nature to do so. Because
they're personally depraved. It doesn't mean they're as bad
as they can be, but it means that they're all bad and that
everything about them is bad. They can get worse, but they're
bad at any given time. Man's nature is ruined. He's ruined He's been ruined
in the fall, and nobody will turn to Christ the way until
they're turned by the grace of God into that way. Some turn to the ways of morality
and some to the ways of self-righteousness and religion. It is always the
way that seemeth right unto man, but the end thereof are the ways
of death, the ways of eternal death. And this is the condition
that we're describing here when we're talking about personal
depravity. I'm talking about something wrong
with you as an individual, something wrong with me, and that is my
nature is a depraved nature. Man by nature is so thoroughly
depraved that he has neither the will nor the ability to do
anything but go astray from God. You know, it's like water under
pressure. Water under pressure will rise above its level. But beloved, listen, a man who
is depraved, spiritually depraved, and who has no, he is not inclined,
he has no pressure from the grace of God upon him, will do nothing,
and he will nothing, except that which is in harmony with his
own nature. I mean, that's all it'll do.
And until the pressure comes from heaven, until my people
are made willing in the day of my power, man will not arise
above sin and go in his own way. ...a pretty gloomy picture of
man, and of his condition, and of his ability, and of his will,
and of his desires. And maybe we have this morning,
but that brings me to the third thing, and I say to you that
there is hope. And we want to preach a little
bit this morning on the third thing that I see here in this
text, and that is the doctrine of substitutionary redemption. And we notice that in this phrase,
and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all. And the Lord hath laid on him
the iniquity of us all. We are in a sorry state, we are
in a very difficult set of circumstances, but there is hope because the
Lord has done something and the Lord has intervened. And the
Lord has laid on Him, that is Jesus Christ, the iniquity of
us all. So this text proclaims that which
we most surely believe and some of us have experienced and we
want to confess because the Bible says, let the redeemed of the
Lord say so. Let him say so. So we want to
confess to you this morning this great doctrine of substitutionary
redemption. This is the heart and the core
of the gospel. You'll never have a foundation
under you till you understand this great truth that's revealed
in this verse. You say, well, Preacher, I read
the verse. Well, you might have read the verse But we've got
to talk a little bit about what it means for the Lord to lay
on Him the iniquity of us all. Now, I want you to notice this.
God the Father, against whom we've sinned, from whom we have
strayed, whose law we have broken, whose justice must be satisfied,
has laid upon Christ, His dear Son, all of the sins of all of
His elect. That's exactly the doctrine that
I'm preaching about. That's what it means. Now, listen
to me this morning. The Son of God was made to be
sin for us. so that he might be justly punished
for sin in our stead and that we might be made the righteousness
of God in him. That's 2 Corinthians 5 and verse
21. Our sins were laid upon Christ
by whose death justice was satisfied and our sins was completely put
away. Our sins were paid for in the
person of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now there was no possible way
for God's elect to be discharged of their sins, but for Christ
to be made sin. Now, I want to stop right here
and say this. Beloved, listen to me this morning.
I'm not talking about a way for you to get rid of your sins. I'm not talking about the way
of religion to get away and to deal with man's sin. I'm not talking about that. I'm
talking about the only way that sin can be put away. In God's universe, His vast universe,
there is one way and one way only whereby man may be free
from his sin. And that's what we're talking
about this morning. We're not talking about a door, we're talking
about the door. We're not talking about a way,
we're talking about the way, the only way, and that is described
for us here, the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all. That's the only way that sin
that can be discharged, that we can get rid of it. Now, I
do not say that it was necessary for God to put away sin. I don't
say that it was necessary for him to do it. Listen to me, there
was nothing in us that compelled God to be gracious There was
nothing about us that would cause God to open up His great heart
of love and spare not His own Son, but deliver Him up that
we might be spared the eternal wrath and judgment of God. There
was nothing in us that would compel him to do that and he
had nothing to be gained from us by choosing to be gracious. God's purpose of grace and his
determination to put away the sins of his people were altogether
a matter of pure sovereignty. It was a matter of pure sovereignty. I mean, this morning, God's will
to save us was a matter of absolute freedom and sovereignty. I mean that He was free to do
it and His great heart of love toward those that He had chosen
in His Son, He purposed to do it and He did it, but there was
nothing that moved Him to do it except His own great heart. Somebody said, well, aren't we
important? Well, you'll have to talk about that. Somebody
else may want to take up that issue. But I'm telling you that
it was a matter of free sovereignty that God Almighty purposed to
save us. It was simply because He willed
to do it. He is gracious because He will
be gracious. He loved us because He would
love us. Because He would. Don't you see
that? It's not of him that willeth
nor of him that runneth, but it's of God that showeth mercy. But I do want to say you this. Once determined, once God determined
to redeem and save and elect people, He could only do it by
the satisfaction of His justice. only by making His own dear Son,
the Lord Jesus Christ, to be sin for us. That's the only way
He could do it. Now then, if our redemption could
be accomplished by any other means, He would have found that
God did not sacrifice His Son for nothing. If your obedience
to the Law of Moses, your keeping of the Ten Commandments, could
have saved you, God would not have hung His Son on a cross.
and I say to you this morning that he hung his son on a cross
because he'd give up on your flesh and on mine and he gave
up on our natures and he said I know these people are ruined
to eternity and therefore I send my son and I lay their iniquity
and sin upon my son and he will become accountable for their
sin. He'll become liable for their
sin. Now listen to me. God, I said,
did not sacrifice his son for nothing. The only way possible
for a fallen man to be just with God was for satisfaction to be
made. It had to be made. God must be
satisfied. His inflexible justice must be
satisfied. The soul that sinneth, it must
die. And therefore, the Lord Jesus
Christ, the only way to satisfy the inflexible justice of God
was for Him to be made God's only begotten Son, to be made
sin and then for Him in a body to be made as a man and for Him
to live here in this world and establish righteousness in the
room of His people and then have our sin all imputed to Him and
to suffer the full penalty of the law, even the death of the
cross. That's the only way that God
has to pardon and save sinners. And from old eternity, in the
covenant of grace, the Lord God looked upon His Son as our Redeemer
and declared with regard to each of His elect, deliver Him from
going down into the pit For I have found a ransom. I have found
a ransom. Deliver him from going down into
the pit. And in his immutable purpose
of grace, he laid on him as the lamb slain from the foundation
of the world, the iniquity of us all. In the fullness of time,
it was done. Christ was made to be sin for
us. Our sin was laid upon him and
he became responsible and liable to God to pay the debt of our
sin. Now this imputation of sin is
so real that our substitute claimed our sin as his own. And in the
scripture he speaks of his sin as if it was his very own sin. Now he said, innumerable evils
have compassed me about. Mine iniquities have taken hold
upon me, so that I'm not able to look up. They're more than
the hairs of mine head, therefore my heart faileth me. O God, thou knowest my foolishness,
and my sins are not hid from thee. at Psalm 40 and verse 12
and Psalm 69 and verse 5 which are Messianic Psalms. They talk
about the Lord Jesus Christ and they describe what he felt when
he was hanging on that glory tree outside of Jerusalem. He owned our sins. Carlock, they were his very own
sins. He claimed our sins as his sins
because they were laid upon him. Now there was no evil in him.
No evil ever committed by Him of any kind, and there was no
possibility of sin in Him or evil in Him. I'm describing our
substitute. I'm describing the Lord Jesus
Christ. I'm describing God's covenant
head. I'm describing the surety of
the better covenant, of the everlasting covenant, the Lord Jesus Christ. Both as God and as man, our Savior
was holy, harmless, undefiled, and separate from sinners, Hebrews
7 and verse 26. Yet the Lord hath laid on Him
the iniquity of us all. God gathered up, if you please,
all the sins of His elect. into one loathsome, hideous bundle,
and then laid them upon the Lord Jesus Christ. For sin not His
own, He died to atone. They were not His. By a mighty
transfer of guilt, He transferred our sins entirely from us to
our Savior, and then punished Him in our stead. I'm talking
about a mighty transfer of guilt. I'm talking about the Lord laying
upon him our iniquity and him owning that iniquity and him
dying because the soul that sinneth it must die. And the Lord Jesus
satisfied the penalty of that law. He died as the greatest
sinner who ever lived and I say it as humbly as I know how. I
say it as respectfully as I know how. The Lord Jesus Christ died
as the greatest sinner that ever walked the face of this earth
because he had the accumulated guilt and sin of all of his people
upon him. And he was a great sinner because
all of our sins were made to meet upon him. Now when a man,
and you listen carefully to what I'm saying here, when a man willingly
makes himself a surety for another, signs another man's note, if
you please, goes on another man's debt and obligation. He assumes
all obligation and responsibility and liability for the original
debtor. If a man says, I'll take his
place on that note, take his name off, put mine on the note.
then he becomes liable for all that the original debtor was
liable for. In the eyes of the law, the original
debtor is freed of all obligation and free of accountability. And the surety has become the
debtor. He's become the one that holds
the bill. The law no longer looks to the original debtor, but to
the surety for whom the debt has been imputed for satisfaction. Christ gave his bond as our surety
in the covenant of grace and God having accepted him as our
surety laid our sins upon his son and he cannot now look for
payment from us. He can't look to us anymore for
payment because the original debtor He has been replaced by
the surety, by the substitute, the one that went on the note
for us. And if he'll have payment for
sin, then he must have it from the one upon whom the debt has
been transferred, upon whom the debt has been transferred. Justice
will not allow that the debt be paid both by us, And by our
surety, it will not allow that. If Christ, our surety, he's paid
the debt, then the elect must go free. They must be pardoned. They must be released. There
must be forgiveness. for the debt because we're no
longer under the obligation. The debt has been assumed by
another and paid by another and so all God's people are free
in the Lord Jesus Christ and the debt of sin is lifted and
they don't owe the justice of God one red cent. You don't owe God nothing this
morning if Jesus Christ has assumed your liability. I'm talking about
a sin debt. Oh, we owe Him all the love of
our hearts. We owe Him that. We owe Him our
service. We owe Him all. We owe Him everything,
but yet... We owe nothing to the justice
of God because the justice of God has been completely satisfied
by the outpouring of the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ and
by the five bleeding wounds that was made that caused his death
on Calvary's Mount. Justice is satisfied. I don't
owe God anything on behalf of my sins. Sins are cancelled out
and I do not have any of them and blessed is the man to whom
the Lord will not impute or a credit sin Romans, I think it is 4 and
verse 8 Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not charge
with sin Now then and this is very important. I had to say
a little about this and I'm winding this up here but I had to say
something about this that it was the Lord God himself and
who made Christ to be sin for us. Now there's a lot of people
in the Arminian circles and in religious circles that are confused
about this. How that the Lord God Himself
made Christ to be sin for us. Legally constituted Him to be
sin in our room and stead and place. The Lord hath laid on
Him. It pleased the Lord, we read this morning, to bruise
Him. He hath put Him to grief. Yes, it was Jehovah Himself who
made His soul an offering for sin. This was God's work. Now sin, the greatest burden
in the world, the most obnoxious thing in the nostrils of God
that's in the universe, The load that must have crushed a world
to hell has been laid upon the God-man by God's own hand. He bore all incarnate God could
bear with strength enough, but none to spare. He bore it because
he was God, but he was made to be sin. Now this great transfer
of sin from the sinner to the sinner's surety was conceived
by the infinite wisdom. It was brought about by the infinite
love and ordained by infinite grace and executed by the infinite
justice, Almighty God. None but Jehovah could do this.
Let me show you what I mean by that. Who but God could lay sin
upon God. Who but God could punish God
for sin? Jesus Christ was God, you know
that, as much God as He was man. As much man as He was God, but
He was God incarnate. And I ask the question, who but
God could lay sin upon God, and who but God could punish God
for sin? I tell you, God Himself had to
do this. He was the author of Calvary. He was the author of the death
of the Lord Jesus Christ on that tree. It pleased the Lord to
bruise Him. Who but God could dispose of sin for the salvation
of His people? Who but God could do that? Now
some think that we lay our sins upon Christ. Some think we do
that. Well, let me tell you this, that
man cannot even lay his hand upon the Son of God, much less
his sin. We don't lay our sin upon the
Lord Jesus Christ. If you imagine that your prayers
and that your tears and your fastings and your mournings and
your confessions and your repentance and your Bible reading can lay
your sin off yourself and on to Christ, you're mistaken. You're
just beating the air. You can't do it. Ain't no one
of you here can lay your sin on Jesus Christ. You can't do
it. Listen, to lay iniquity upon
Christ is the work of Jehovah, God alone. It was It was the
Lord that hath laid our iniquity upon Him. Salvation is in the
first part, in the middle part, in the last part of the Lord.
It's all of Him. And it was caused by the Almighty
love and grace in His own heart moved Him to do this. Well, be
sure you understand this. And I want you to understand
it, that God will never make another transfer of sin. He's not going to do it anymore.
It's been done one time and he's not going to do it anymore. Now
this morning I'd like to ask you this question. In that great
transfer of sin onto the sin bearing the Lord Jesus Christ,
the just one who was hanging on that tree for the unjust Was
your sin transferred at that time? There are not going to
be any other transfers. Was it transferred when that sin, all
that guilt, that hideous bundle we talked about, loathsome bundle
of sin was placed upon the Lord Jesus Christ? Was your sin transferred
then? It ain't going to be transferred
no more. That's it. you say well preacher I don't
know what can I do you can believe that it was transferred believe
it believe it believe that it was transferred now my friend
listen to me you ought to go home and write it down on the
paper you say well I don't believe it preacher I don't believe that
it was well go home and write that down on the paper I do not
believe that my sins were transferred in that one great transfer of
sin that God Almighty made to the person of His Son. I don't
believe it was. And my friend, you'll die and
you'll sin and go to hell. It ought to wake you up if you
write it down and read it. I don't believe that my sins
were transferred. And if you do believe that your
sin was transferred in that great bundle of sin that was placed
upon the Lord Jesus Christ, write it down. I believe that my sin
was transferred in that great bundle of sin onto the very head
of the Lord Jesus Christ himself. I believe it! And if you can
say, I believe it, then rise and be baptized and arise and
join the Lord's church and walk with Him and quit fooling around
about it. You either believe it or you
don't believe it. You either trust Christ or you don't trust
Him. And if you trust Him and if you believe it, then my friend,
this is no matter that we can just dilly-dally around with. There will be no more transfer
of sin. It's a once done business. Was your sin transferred or was
it not? Deal with that in your soul. Now sin once laid upon Christ,
there's no moment in time, there is no possible condition in which
God will ever transfer sin back from Christ to his people. He ain't gonna do it. You say,
Preacher, you sound like a Calvinist. I am a Calvinist. I do believe
in the eternal salvation of God's people. I do believe that God's
people are forever, forever saved because Christ died for them
and that their sin can never be transferred back from the
Lord's people unto, or from Christ to the Lord's people. Sin, what's
laid upon Christ, the scapegoat, is carried away into the land
of forgetfulness, never to be seen or brought back again. It's
carried away. It's carried away. We have the
example of that in the Old Testament. where sin was transferred onto
the head of the scapegoat and the scapegoat was taken off into
the wilderness and he never could return because he was taken away
away where he could never find his way back again and this is
the most wonderful, it's the most astounding, the most amazing
thing ever performed by the great God of the Bible and I'm amazed,
listen to me, that God that He made His Son to be a man that
it made his son to be a poor man, that his son became a crucified
man, but when I read that he, God, made him to be sin for us,
this is too wonderful, it's too sublime, it's too mysterious,
it's too divine for my puty brain to comprehend this, but it's
true, it's true because the text says the Lord hath laid on him
the iniquity of us all, and we ought to rejoice in it, we ought
to believe it, and we ought to give God thanks for it, because
it is our salvation. It's our salvation. It's our
eternal life. It's our hope of eternal glory
and everlasting bliss. The fact that God made him to
be sin for us. That's the reason for the singing
of the saints. That's the reason for the praise
of the people of God. That's the reason for it. He
was made to be sin for us. We're not trying to get to heaven.
We're not trying to do something with our sins with a shovel digging
a hole and burying them. We're not trying to put them
away. They've been put away. Hallelujah. Christ has put them
away. They were laid on Him. He took
care of that. That's not anything we're dealing with anymore. That's
already been taken care of. The debt was paid. And we rejoice
in it and we're glad our sins being laid upon that man who
is God Almighty Has been affectionately put away and that forever and
amen Amen, they've been put away now. I hope this morning If you're
here and you've listened to this message, I realize that this
is not ordinary preaching. It's not the kind of preaching
that you hear in this day and time. It sounds like something
that came out of the dark ages someplace, but my friend, listen
to me. We've gotten away from the Bible
and the truths of scripture, and I want you, you dear souls,
you're very precious to me, and I want each one of you to hear
the truth. and I want you to be free and
the truth will make you free and if you understand what happened
if you understand what happened at the fall If you understand
what happened in Calvary, you'll understand what happens when
God saves a sinner. You'll understand it and you'll
be able to rejoice in it and praise the Lord for it. And there's
so many people that are confused. They don't know nothing about
the garden, they don't know nothing about Calvary, and they know
less about what takes place when God saves a sinner experientially.
But I hope this morning that each one of you will be brought
to a place in your life by this message where you'll take serious
take serious what God's done in laying sin on his son and
that you'll become his worshipper and his loyal follower his disciple
may God bless this message Larry do you have