I want you to turn with me to
a most familiar text of Scripture, 2 Corinthians chapter 5 and verse
21. Now, I would not in any way depreciate
any part of God's Word. I would not make any doctrine
of Holy Scripture a matter of insignificance. We recognize
that all scripture, all scripture, is given by inspiration of God,
and all scripture is profitable for doctrine, that which is taught
in the word we believe and rejoice in. But if I were called upon
to do so, and I think it's needful that we do, I could use one word
to describe the message of the Bible. The Word of God teaches
many precious doctrines, doctrines we love, doctrines we love to
proclaim, doctrines in which we rejoice. Yet all the doctrines
of the Bible may be summed up in one doctrine, and that is
the doctrine taught in our text. It is the doctrine of substitution.
Here we read the Apostle Paul saying, He, that is God our Father,
hath made him, the Lord Jesus Christ, to be sin for us, him
who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of
God in him." Now, I have said that the doctrines, all the doctrines
of Scripture, all the various revelations of Scripture, declare
this doctrine of substitution. Let me show you what I mean.
We recognize and believe and rejoice in the Bible doctrine
of creation. We recognize that all things
were made by our God. But we can only properly understand
creation if we understand that all things were created for and
by the Lord Jesus Christ, our substitute. We delight in the
doctrine of God's providence. It's a wonderful and precious
truth of scripture, full of comfort to our hearts. But what is providence? It is the upholding of all things
by the word and the power of our substitute. It is the rule
of Jesus Christ, our substitute over all things for the salvation
of his people. I fully believe the doctrines
of eternal election and divine predestination. I'm not at all
bashful to proclaim them, but election is in the person of
Christ. divorce election from the person
of Christ and you have nothing but cold calculated reasoning. We recognize the doctrine of
predestination and delight in it. But predestination is that
we should be conformed to the image of Jesus Christ, our substitute. We delight in, we glory in the
doctrine of the atonement, the full satisfaction of divine justice,
the full pardon of sin. But if there were no substitute,
no suitable mediator between God and man. If there was no
one who could satisfy the needs of fallen man and the justice
of the Holy God, the possibility of atonement is altogether gone.
We delight in the blessed revelations of Scripture concerning glorification,
the final glorification of God's saints. Yet, that blessed truth
of glorification is only realized when we recognize that the hope
of future glory is that we be conformed exactly to the image
of Christ, our divine substitute. The central theme of scripture,
the central theme of divine revelation is substitution. Everything in
the word of God points to Jesus Christ dying in the place of
his people. Every ritual of the Levitical
priesthood, Every garment worn by the priest, every sacrifice,
every article of furniture in the tabernacle, the tabernacle
itself, all the laws of Israel, the temple, the temple service,
and all the prophets of God have one message, and they proclaim
it plainly and clearly. God commended his love toward
us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Now, the substitutionary death
of Christ, was the only foundation of hope for God's saints in the
Old Testament and it is the only foundation of hope for God's
saints today. The only hope for perishing sinners
is in the blood atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ of our substitute. Turn with me to Luke 24. Luke
chapter 24. Now I want you to see that what
I'm saying is the very revelation of Christ himself. Here in Luke
24, Our Lord is giving us these words concerning the disciples
on the road to Emmaus and his exposition to them of the scriptures. And in verse 44, He said unto
them, These are the words which I spake unto you while I was
yet with you, that all things must be fulfilled, which were
written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the
Psalms concerning me. That is all of the Old Testament
scriptures written concerning me. Now look at the next line.
Then opened he their understanding, that they might understand the
scriptures, that they might understand the message of the scriptures,
that they might understand the revelation of God given in his
word. And this is it. He said unto
them, thus it is written, and thus it behooved Christ to suffer
and to rise from the dead the third day. In other words, our
Lord is saying, I have told you plainly that the message of divine
revelation, the message of Holy Scripture, is the sacrifice of
the Son of God in the place of sinners upon the appointment
of God our Father from all eternity. I've told you that the message
of the Law and the Prophets and the Psalms is that Jesus Christ,
the Son of God, should die according to the Scriptures and be raised
again the third day. Try, if the Lord will enable
me, one more time to give you an exposition of this 21st verse
of 2 Corinthians 5. You read the text with me one
more time and follow along as we go through the passage. He
hath made him to be sin for us who knew no sin, that we might
be made the righteousness of God in him. Nothing thrills my
soul like the message of this text. The great God, the God
of all glory, the God who created and sustains and rules all things,
the God who made the world, the God who is the God of our heart
worship, he has made his dear son to be sin for us. In order to save his people,
he has taken our sin and our guilt and laid it upon His only
begotten Son, making Him to be sin for us, even Him who knew
no sin. In consequence of this transfer,
this transfer of sin from the sinner to the sinner's surety,
of sin from the sinner to the sinner's substitute, every soul
that believes, every one who trusts Jesus Christ, receives
full pardon and perfect righteousness in God's sight. Our faith in
Jesus Christ gives us the blessed knowledge of and the blessed
assurance of and the blessed confidence of full pardon from
all sin and perfect righteousness in the sight of God. Christ was
made sin that sinners might be made righteous. The very righteousness
of God in him. That's substitution. Now I want
us to understand as clearly as mortal men can understand. And
I want us to rejoice in the knowledge of divine substitution. So to
that purpose, let me answer three questions. Number one, who is
our substitute? Whoever it is that undertakes
to be the substitute for guilty fallen men, and by his substitutionary
death to reconcile us to God, must himself be both God and
man. He must be man, for it is man
that sins. And he must be punished as a
man, for man by sin deserves the wrath of God. Yet that substitute
must be God, because only the infinite God could satisfy divine
justice. Let me give you a couple of scriptures.
In Ezekiel 33, our Lord declares by the prophet, I have no pleasure
in the death of him that dieth. Now, that passage is not giving
us some kind of an imaginary theory that God somehow takes
delight in the death of sinners, in punishing sinners. That's
not what he's talking about at all. The Lord is declaring that
by the punishment of men, should he cast the whole world into
hell, should all Adam's fallen race forever suffer the wrath
of God, God's justice could never be satisfied. He takes no pleasure,
he finds no pleasure in the death of sinners. Though we should
suffer the wrath of God forever and ever, there is no satisfaction
to justice. That's the reason hell's eternal.
But then the prophet Isaiah says, it pleased the Lord to bruise
him. That is, God does take pleasure
in. He does find satisfaction in
the substitutionary death of Jesus Christ. For here is one
who is himself God Almighty, and he is able to satisfy the
justice of God to its nth degree. Who is our substitute? Jesus
Christ, our substitute, is himself the eternal God. He's not a God,
he's not like God, he's not a creature of God. He is himself God Almighty. He is God over all, blessed forever. The prophet said his name shall
be called Wonderful, Counselor, the Mighty God. And his name
is what he is. When he was upon the earth, men
worshipped him as God. The apostle tells us that God
was manifest in the flesh. Not only is Jesus Christ the
Son of God, He is Himself God the Son. He possesses all the
attributes of divinity. He is in every way equal with
the Father, for He is one with the Father. We recognize that
Jesus Christ our Lord is Himself independent, immutable, self-sufficient,
almighty, all-wise, perfect, holy. He is God, God Himself
manifest in human flesh. It is written of Christ, that
he is the brightness of the Father's glory and the express image of
his person. Language couldn't be clearer.
If Jesus Christ is not God, then he's an imposter. We're found
false witnesses of God and we're yet in our sins worshiping one
who is no more God than a piece of stone or some graven image
out of a stick or out of a piece of molten gold or silver. Jesus
Christ is himself the eternal God, possessing all the attributes
of divinity. I recognize that everybody here
confesses that. You know the truthfulness of
these things, but I want you in your hearts to realize the
wonder of this. That very God who made the universe,
that very God who is eternal, incomprehensible, and glorious,
that God is the God who died in the place of sinners upon
Mount Calvary. Hereby perceive we the love of
God because He That one who is himself God laid down his life
for us. Paul charged the Ephesian elders
saying, feed the church of God, which he had purchased with his
own blood. But how can this be? Can the
eternal God die? Well, the answer to that question
is just this. By means of the incarnation,
God joined himself to man in the person of Jesus Christ. Our
substitute is also a man. Drew and I were talking about
this this morning. God did not become a man. Man did not become
a God. But the two are forever and inseparably
joined in one glorious person. And Jesus Christ is the Godman. He is the Godman. He is just
as perfectly and truly God as though he were not man. And he
is just as fully and completely man as though he were not God.
There is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man,
Christ Jesus. Now, this marvelous incarnation
of Christ, it's beyond the scope of our reason. We can't possibly
comprehend how that God Almighty, all that God is, in all his infinite
being, should come into this world in human flesh as a man,
a real man like we are. But that's exactly the revelation
of Scripture. Jesus Christ, our God, is also
the man of Nazareth. He is the son of Mary. He is
that one who lived on this earth as a real man, just like you
and I do. Our Lord Jesus is just as really
and truly a man as anyone here. I can't comprehend it. Maybe
I can just state it so that you can rejoice in it. When our Lord
Jesus came into the womb of the Virgin Mary, His humanity, his
body, his life was fully dependent upon the fluids of his mother's
womb. And yet he at the same time is
God who made the womb and provides the fluids in the womb. When
he nursed to his mother's breast, his life was dependent upon the
milk of her breast. He could not live without the
milk of her breast. And yet, at the same time, He
is God over all things who provides the milk in the breast. And when
our Lord Jesus hung upon the cursed tree, He died as a real
man. He suffered real agony and real
torment upon that tree. And He died under the wrath of
God. And yet, He never ceased to be
God. He's God Almighty manifest in
human flesh. No tongue can ever describe the
full meaning of our Lord's incarnation are the Apostle's words when
he declares, great is the mystery, great is the wonder of godliness. God was manifest in the flesh. There's a description of our
Savior's person and yet still something is needful. He who
bears the sins of God's elect must himself be without sin. Our text says, he hath made him
to be sin for us who knew no sin. Now, if you read the biography
of our Lord in the four Gospels, that is, the biography of His
life upon this earth, you cannot help but to recognize that if
ever a man had any cause to sin, it was the man Christ Jesus.
Our Lord Jesus Christ, as He lived upon this earth, suffered
as never a man suffered. No man ever lived in such humiliation
and sorrow continually from the cradle to the grave as did our
Lord Jesus Christ. The Apostle Paul says, it became
him for whom are all things in bringing many sons to glory to
make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings. Wes,
it wouldn't be possible for him to be your redeemer if he didn't
suffer what you suffer in this world. It wouldn't be possible
for him to be a perfect redeemer and a perfect mediator were he
not the man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. He was tempted as
never a man was tempted. Our Lord Jesus, when he was in
this world, was tempted of Satan. He was constantly tempted to
evil. Wherefore, in all things it behooved him. It was necessary
for him to be made like unto his brethren, that he might be
a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to
God, to make reconciliation for the sins of the people. For in
that he himself hath suffered being tempted, he is able to
succor them that are tempted. And his faith, his faith was
tried as never faith was tried. You see, our Lord Jesus lived
by faith in this world just like we do. Only he lived with perfect
faith. He lived by faith in God the
Father, just as you and I live by faith in God. He depended
upon God for his daily bread, though he is God. He depended
upon God for his daily sustenance, though he is himself God. And
as a man in this world, he lived continually by faith. And his
faith was tried. When he was in the wilderness
of temptation, his faith was tried. Tried like our faith has
never been tried. When he was in the garden of
Gethsemane, I don't know how to explain all that happened
there, but in that garden, his faith was tried. His faith and
his faithfulness severely tried. So that the apostle says, in
the days of his flesh, when he had offered up prayers and supplications
with strong crying and tears unto him that was able to save
him from death and was heard in that he feared. Our Lord then
was made to suffer in this world as a man, and yet he never had
sin. He knew no sin. He was holy. He is holy, harmless, undefiled,
and separate from sinners. So pure, so holy is our Savior
in heart and conduct that He challenged the Jews, His enemies,
saying, Which of you convinces me of sin? For such an high priest
became us, the Apostle says again, who is holy, harmless, undefiled,
and separate from sinners. His eyes were never inflamed
with unholy anger. His lips never uttered a treacherous
or deceitful word. His heart was never hot with
lust or cold with malice. That one whose name is holy and
reverend is replete with every virtue. He never once broke a
command of God. He never once left undone any
point of duty, anything that ought to be done. He had no personal
acquaintance with sin. He had no communion with sin.
He is the lily of the valley. He's a rose among thorns. Our
Lord Jesus lived in this world without the slightest possibility
of sin in Himself. He was born in perfect holiness
and he lived in perfect holiness from the cradle to the grave,
but he did it as a public person. There was no need for himself
that he should come into this world and live in obedience to
God. But as a public person, as our substitute, as our federal
head, as our surety, as our representative, he came into this world saying,
Lo, I come to do thy will, O God. And from the beginning to the
end of his days, he lived in righteousness to establish righteousness
for his people. He brought in an everlasting
righteousness such as God requires for man. Now, let me ask this
question and answer it as well. How? How was this perfect holy
God-man made to be sin for us? Now, turn over to 1 Corinthians
15. 1 Corinthians 15. I want you to read verse 3. Paul says, for I delivered unto
you, first of all, that which I also received, how that Christ
died for our sins according to the scriptures. In verse one,
he declares that this is the gospel. It is not the gospel. Now, hear me carefully. Hear
me carefully. It is not the gospel, Rex, to
declare that Christ died and rose again. It is not even the
gospel to declare that he did it according to the scriptures.
The gospel, the message of the gospel hinges on that little
three-letter word, how. How did Christ die? How did this
one who is himself God Almighty come to die in the place of sinners?
How did this holy one die under the wrath of God to make satisfaction
to divine justice? Now answer the question, how,
and you'll understand the gospel. Answer this question. Find the
answer to this question. How that Christ died and you
understand the message of the Holy Scriptures. We do not believe
in Jesus Christ after the flesh. That is, Paul says, we don't
know him after the flesh. We don't know him merely as the
historical Jesus. We don't know him merely as one
who lived, even a God who lived on this earth and died in the
place of sinners. But we know him after the Spirit.
We know Him after the revelation of the Spirit of God through
the Word in our own hearts. We understand what the world
can never understand, how that Christ died for our sins according
to the Scriptures. What does the Scripture teach
us? Our text tells us plainly that God the Father made His
only begotten, dearly beloved Son to be sin for us. And my friends, the transaction
that took place at Mount Calvary took place between the three
persons of the eternal Godhead. Our Lord Jesus Christ died according
to his Father's eternal decree. He was delivered by the determinate
counsel and foreknowledge of God. He verily was foreordained
as a lamb slain before the foundation of the world. The prophet Isaiah
tells us that he was smitten of God. The Lord hath laid on
him the iniquity of us all. It pleased the Lord to bruise
him. God has put him to grief. So
our Lord Jesus, when he died upon the cross, died according
to the eternal purpose of God. This is the object which God
had in mind when he made the world. The Lord Jesus Christ
came into this world and died according to God's divine appointment,
according to God's providential arrangement. Everything that
came to pass up to that time pointed to that. Everything was
leading to that. Everything was being brought
to this point in time. His hour, the hour of God's glorious
revelation, the hour when God would be made manifest in this
world, was at the death of Jesus Christ upon the cross. Now, our
Father so sovereignly rules the universe, so sovereignly controls
and manipulates the affairs of man, that everything, both good
and evil, Everything in heaven and in earth. Everything in the
minds of men and in the minds of demons. Everything is ruled
by God or overruled by God to bring about this redemption which
Christ accomplished at Calvary. Everything. Nothing was left
to chance. You say, well, did God cause
Judas to betray Him or cause Pilate to crucify Him or cause
the Jews to reject Him? Not on your life. God did not
cause men to do evil, but God so rules the world that He controls
the evil which men do according to their own wills and He brought
to pass that which He purposed from eternity. Our Lord God,
who hung upon the cursed tree, is the one who made the tree
upon which He hung. He's God Almighty. He's God Almighty. And our Lord Jesus died according
to his own voluntary will. You see, he came with a mission.
He had a work to perform. He said, Lo, I come to do thy
will, O God, and by this will we are sanctified through the
offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. Our Lord
Jesus willingly, voluntarily, deliberately, as our covenant
head and representative from old eternity, submitted himself
to obedience to the triune God. He submitted himself as our surety
to the obedience of his father's will for the accomplishment of
our redemption. And when he came into this world,
he came here to fulfill that will of God set forth in the
covenant of grace before the world began. So that when he
comes, he says, now I lay down my life for myself. No man takes
it from me. I have the power to lay it down.
I have the power to take it again. This commandment have I received
of my father. He was brought willingly under
the bondage of the covenant of grace as our surety to satisfy
justice on our behalf and to put away our sins. Now the apostle
Paul tells us in this passage here in second Corinthians. that
not only was Christ made to be a sin offering for his people,
that's true, but he hath made him to be sin. Now, I can't explain that. I
can't explain that, but I can rejoice in it. I can rejoice
in it. What can these words mean? God
Almighty so fully made Christ our substitute that when he died
at Mount Calvary he became sin for us. God imputed our sins
to Christ and he so perfectly bore our sins that he claimed
our sins as his own. Turn back to Psalm 40. We'll just look at this one text. First time I read this, my heart
just jumped up and down, turned flips. This is blessing. This is blessing. This 40th Psalm, the Apostle
Paul in Hebrews 10 tells us plainly is a messianic psalm. It speaks
of Christ. Indeed, it is Christ speaking
in the psalm. We read in verse Six, sacrifice
and offering thou wouldest, thou didst not desire. Verse seven,
then said I, lo, I come. Verse eight, I delight to do
thy will, O my God. Verse nine, I preach righteousness.
Verse 10, I have not hid thy righteousness within my heart.
Now look at verse 11. It's the same substitute who's
speaking. And he speaks these words only as a substitute. He
speaks these words only as a surety and a representative. He speaks
to God the Father as our representative. And he says, withhold not thy
tender mercies from me, O Lord. Let thy loving kindness and thy
truth continually preserve me. For 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. Mark, do you see that? He took
your iniquities. He said, they're mine. They're
mine, mine iniquity. So that he really was made to
be sin. Not only was sin imputed to him,
but he willingly took our sin upon himself and made it his
very own. By imputation, God made Christ
to be sin, and Jesus Christ was made to be sin to this degree.
I fully agree with Martin Luther. He said, when Jesus Christ died,
he died as the greatest sinner who ever lived. For God made
all the sins of all his elect to meet upon the head of the
substitute, and he was made to be sin for us. Made sin. You look at Him as He hangs upon
the tree. He bears your guilt and mine,
children of God. What a horrible, what an amazing
sight. My sin, oh, the bliss of this
glorious thought. My sin, not in part, but the
whole is nailed to His cross and I bear it no more. Praise
the Lord, it is well with my soul. This was our Savior's deepest
agony. He was made to be sin. Having been made sin for us, God Almighty treated His Son
as sin. He was crucified between two
thieves, and He was made a curse for us. Not only was He cursed,
but He was made a curse. Christ hath redeemed us from
the curse of the law, being made a curse for us. For it is written,
Cursed is everyone that hangeth on a tree. God's own dear Son,
who knew no sin, was so made to be sin that He became the
just object of God's violent wrath. He was forsaken by His
Father. He cries, my God, my God, why
hast thou forsaken me? And the dead silence of heaven
declares he is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity. That's
why he forsook him. Because he was made to be sin,
God would not look upon his son. God would not smile upon his
son. God would not show his son any
favor whatever. He was made to be sin and so
forsaken of God and slain under the flood of divine justice.
The Lord God drew out the sword of his justice and said away
go sword against one that is my fellow smite the shepherd. And he buried the sword of justice
in the heart of his dear son so that his justice is all together
swallowed up in the heart of Jesus Christ who was made to
be sin. What was the result of this marvelous
substitutionary sacrifice? Now, I keep stressing this. I'm
convinced it must be stressed. Either our Lord Jesus Christ
actually, effectually accomplished redemption by his death on the
cross, or he is not God. He either effectually accomplished
what he came here to do, or he failed in his work, and our God
is no failure. to deny the effectual atonement
of Christ, to deny that Jesus Christ put away the sins of His
people, to deny that Jesus Christ satisfied justice, to deny that
Jesus Christ redeemed God's elect, is to deny His Godhead as much
as it is to deny His virgin birth. Our Lord Jesus Christ is Himself
an effectual Redeemer who has accomplished redemption on our
behalf. Our pardon was accomplished by
the death of Christ. When he cried, it is finished,
our sins were put away. I mean put away. I mean forever
expunged from the record of God's justice, forever expunged from
the record of heaven so that God says in that day, I'll look
for their iniquities, I'll look for their transgressions and
there shall be none. Our sins were put away, forever
put away, so that God in holiness, God in justice, God in truth
cannot charge with sin those for whom Christ died. Blessed
is the man to whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity. Blessed is the
man whom God will not charge with sin. The law, the justice,
and the holiness of God were fully satisfied by the blood
of God's dear Son. When the Lord God heard his son
cry, it is finished. He declares that's enough. That's
enough. I require no more. I require
no more. God was reconciled to his people
by the death of his son. God's own righteousness was imputed
to us so that God took his people as being perfectly righteous. We were made the righteousness
of God in him. John Gill said, Just as Christ
was made sin or a sinner by the imputation of the sins of others
to him, so we are made righteousness or righteous persons through
the imputation of his righteousness to them. Romans 5, turn over
to Romans 5 verse 19. Listen to Paul's reasoning here.
In verse 12, he says, Wherefore, as by one man's sin entered into
the world, and death by sin. And so death passed upon all
men, for that all have sinned. When our father Adam sinned in
the garden, without us doing a thing, without us doing a thing,
we became sin. We didn't do a thing to become
sinners. Adam did it. A representative did it. A substitute
did it. God made Adam in the image and
likeness of Jesus Christ, who was to come the second Adam.
So that the second Adam was the one God had in mind when he made
the first Adam. And when Adam sinned in the garden,
we were made sinners by his transgression. And we received from our father
Adam a depraved sinful nature. In exactly the same way, we're
made righteous. Look in verse 19. For as by one
man's disobedience, Adam's, many were made sinners. So by the
obedience of one, the Lord Jesus Christ, the second Adam, shall
many be made righteous. Without doing a thing, without
doing anything, without doing anything, we are made the very
righteousness of God in Jesus Christ. And then in the new birth,
we receive from Christ a righteous nature, a nature that is of God
himself, born of God, a nature that's holy and righteous and
good, the nature of Christ himself. For that multitude of sinners
for whom Christ Jesus died, there is no possibility. I repeat,
there is no possibility of condemnation. Paul says, there is therefore
now no condemnation. to them that are in Christ Jesus.
For what the law could not do, and that it was weak through
the flesh, God sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful
flesh, and for sin condemned sin in the flesh. So that now,
in Christ, if Jesus Christ has redeemed us, if He has put away
our sin, if He stood before God's law on our behalf, it's impossible
It's impossible for a just God to condemn us. The justice of
God cries as loudly as the mercy of God for the pardon of those
transgressors for whom Christ Jesus died. Justice satisfied
cannot demand more. Pain with God cannot twice demand,
first at my bleeding surety's hand and then again at mine.
Christ Jesus put away our sins. He satisfied divine justice. He made us perfectly righteous.
And now there is no condemnation. Not now, not tomorrow, not ever. No condemnation, no judgment,
nothing for the believer to bear under the wrath of God. Christ
has borne and satisfied all. Free from the law, O happy condition,
Jesus hath bled and there is remission. Cursed by the law
and bruised by the fall, grace hath redeemed us once for all. Now are we free, there's no condemnation. Jesus provides a perfect salvation. Now let us, if God will enable
us, worship this dear substitute. Oh, God, help us to know, love,
and worship Christ in his glorious substitutionary character. Adore
our Savior, ye chosen seed of Israel's race, ye ransomed from
the fall. Hail him who saves you by his
grace. and crown him Lord of all. Reverently
adore the justice of our God. Before God would tarnish his
justice, before he would tarnish his righteousness and his holy
character, in order to redeem and save his people, God made
his son to be sin and poured out his wrath upon his own son
for the full satisfaction of justice. Behold here the wisdom of God.
Through the cross, we have the revelation of all the wisdom
of God, so that everything you and I need to know of sin and
holiness, justice and mercy, life and death, heaven and hell,
God and man, is revealed in the cross. There all the attributes
of God are fully displayed. Bow your hearts and worship the
God of all grace. love and mercy. God commendeth his love toward
us and that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us here
in his love. Not that we loved God but he
loved us and sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins.
Our Lord did not die so that God would love us. He died because
God so loved us that he would have us as his own sons. He died
because God from eternity set his heart upon us and determined
to save us and adore the sovereignty of our Lord Jesus Christ. Turn
over to Hebrews 2, Hebrews chapter 2. Do you know that when the angels
sinned, when Satan led that revolt in heaven, And all the fallen
angels chose to follow him. They did exactly what Adam did
in the garden. They did exactly the same thing. Satan said, I'll
be God. I'll make myself to sit upon
the throne of God. I'll take over. And in the garden,
Adam said, I'll be God. I'll take myself and set myself
upon the throne of God. I'll take over. God's got no
right to rule over me. But when Adam sinned, something
happened that did not happen when Satan sinned. When Adam
sinned against God, God provided a substitute, a surety. He provided
one to redeem some of the fallen sons of Adam. Look over here
in Hebrews 2 verse 16. For verily, he took not on him
the nature of angels, The Lord God passed by the angels that
fell. He did not show the angels that
fell any mercy. He provided no ransom for the
angels that fell, but rather He took on Him the seed, not
of Adam, but the seed of Abraham. He took on Him a covenant seed. He took on Him a chosen people,
and He became one for us. He became one with us, for us,
that He might deliver us. He took hold of Abraham's seed
to deliver Abraham's seed. Our Lord Jesus Christ came into
this world for the purpose of redeeming a chosen people according
to his own sovereign will. What precious truth this is. Why is it that the blood of Christ
was shed for us and not for others? Why did God send the light of
the gospel to us while he left millions to live and die in darkness? having never even heard the sound
of the good news of redemption accomplished. Are we better than
they? Certainly not. We are this day
washed in the blood of the Lamb only because of God's sovereign
grace and distinguishing love. O glorious sovereignty, He makes
us to differ, for He gave His Son to redeem us. O my heart, Love the substitute. Love him. Love him for who he is. Love
him for his great sacrifice. Love him because of what he has
made you. He took my sin and made it his. And being made to be sin, he
received the just wage of sin, he died. Lindsay took his righteousness
and made it to be yours. And being made righteous, you
shall receive the just wage of righteousness, eternal life.
That's substitution. That's substitution. Let us worship Christ our substitute
with all the fullness of joy, confidence, and assurance. Our
hearts should be filled with joy as we contemplate the fullness
and perfection of our salvation in Christ. We don't need to wait
until we get to glory to begin to enjoy our salvation, for at
this very moment, our hearts should be leaping and dancing
before God our Savior. Beloved, now are we the sons
of God. Right now, we are the sons of
God. Right now, we are fully pardoned. Right now, our salvation is an
immutable, unchanging, unchangeable fact. We are the sons of God,
accepted in the Beloved, and that's forever. Soon, we will
stand before our Savior without sin, perfect, complete, and glorious. God is mine. Christ is mine. Heaven is mine. Why shouldn't
I rejoice? Because Christ is my substitute. God make him to be yours for
Christ's sake. Amen.