Todd's Road Grace Church would
like to invite you to listen to a sermon by our pastor, Todd
Neidert. We are located at 4137 Todd's
Road, two miles outside of Manowar Boulevard. Sunday services are
at 1030 a.m. and 6 p.m. Bible study is at
945 a.m. Wednesday services are at 7 p.m. Nursery is provided for all services.
For more information, visit our website at toddsroadgracechurch.com.
Now here's our pastor, Todd Nibert. I've entitled the message, Christ
Numbered with the Transgressors. We read in Luke chapter 22, beginning
in verse 36, Then said he unto them, But now he that hath a
purse, let him take it, and likewise his script. And he that hath
no sword, let him sell his garment, and buy one. For I say unto you,
that this that is written must yet be accomplished in me." And
then he quotes Isaiah chapter 53, verse 12, and he was reckoned
among the transgressors. For the things concerning me
have an end. Christ reckoned among the transgressors. And the first thing that I would
like to call to your attention is that our Lord says, I say
unto you that this which is written must yet be accomplished. The gospel is the religion of
that which is written, the Bible, the scriptures, the word of God. The Bible claims to be inspired. All scripture is given by inspiration
of God. Every word in the Old Testament
and the New Testament is God-breathed. He spoke through men, different
individuals over a period of 1,500 years, but they all have
the same message. Every word is God-breathed. There is no error in it. Somebody said, I have a hard
time believing that. Okay, but still so. If God can create the
universe, God can inspire men to write a book and to preserve
it without error. Now, there are some things that
we can know about God without the scriptures. For instance,
if you look at creation, according to Romans 1.20, And we know that
the invisible things of Him from the creation of the world are
clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made,
even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse.
Anyone can look at this creation, this beautiful creation, and
they can see the power of God. Somebody had to cause this. And
He was all-powerful. This stuff didn't just happen.
It didn't just appear. Somebody had to cause it, and
He's eternal. No one caused Him. People can
see that, but there's a lot of things we cannot know apart from
the Bible. For instance, is God just? Does God love sinners? Is there
such a thing as sin? Is there the forgiveness of sin?
Will God punish sinners? Will there be mercy and grace? These are things that only the
Bible answers. We can't know the answer to these
things simply by looking at creation. We can tell God is powerful,
all-powerful, and never had a beginning. He's infinite. He dwells outside
of time. Those things are logical. You
can know that by logic, but you can't know that God will forgive
sins. or even if there is such a thing
as sin, or if there's such a thing as grace and mercy, you can't
know these things apart from the written Word of God. These
are questions only the Bible answers. Now, can I prove that
the Bible is inspired? No. Can you prove it's not? No. Can I prove God is? No. Can you prove he's not? No. You see, deep down, everybody
knows God is. Somebody says, I'm agnostic or
I'm an atheist. No, you're not. No, you're not.
Now, you may have convinced yourself that you are because you don't
want God to exist. But deep down, everybody knows
God is. And you can't get away from that.
You can deny it all you want. But when you're alone by yourself,
you know God is. You're just choosing not to believe
that way. But still, underneath the facade,
you know that He is. Now, He quotes, our Lord, when
He's using the Scriptures, He quotes Isaiah chapter 53, 6.
But let me read this verse again. For I say unto you, that this
that is written, speaking of Isaiah 53, 6, oh, the respect
the Lord had for the Scriptures. When the devil tempted him all
three times, his reply to the devil was, "'It is written.'"
"'It is written.'" "'It is written.'" Don't ever forget of the importance
of the Scripture. And the Lord quotes this passage
of Scripture from Isaiah 53, verse 12. It says, "'Therefore
will I divide him a portion with the great, And he shall divide
the spoiled with the strong, because he hath poured out his
soul unto death. And he was numbered with the
transgressors. That's what our Lord is quoting. And he bare the sins of many,
and he made intercession for the transgressors. Now, what
does that mean, he was numbered with the transgressors? Now,
let's remember who he is, the Son of Man, the Son of God. the
virgin-born Son of God. Was He really born of a virgin?
Yes, He was. Yes, He was. With God, all things are possible.
God the Holy Spirit caused God the Son to be conceived in the
womb of Mary. Yes, I believe that with all
my heart. Somebody says, well, why is that
even important? Because if He was born with Adam's seed, He
would have been born with an evil nature like you and I. But
he was born without an evil nature. He was born holy, harmless, undefiled,
and separate from sinners. He knew no sin. Do you know he didn't even have
the ability to sin? He was impeccable. Just like
God cannot lie, Jesus Christ could not sin. I've heard people
say, well, there wasn't any strength in his temptations if he couldn't
sin in the first place. Well, you can say that if you
want. That's foolishness. He could
not sin. Holiness can't sin. You say,
well, what about Adam when he sinned? He wasn't holy. He was
innocent. He was innocent. He wasn't holy.
Holiness is immutable. Holiness cannot sin. And the
Lord Jesus Christ, the Holy One of Israel, the One who never
sinned, was numbered with the transgressors. Now, why? If he's holy, if he's harmless,
how could he be numbered with the transgressors? If He never
sinned, how can He be numbered and counted with the transgressors?
Well, first, what's a transgressor? 1 John 3, verse 4 tells us that
sin is the transgression of the law, the holy law of God. God gave the Ten Commandments. Thou shalt have no other God
before God. You're not to make any idols,
any likenesses to God. You know, if you compare God
to anything, you're bringing Him down to a lower level. That's
why idolatry is so evil. It's bringing God down to a lower
level or an attempt to do so. Thank God we can't really do
that, but that person, if they could, they would. The commandment
regarding not taking His name in vain. Holy and reverend is
His name. Remember the Sabbath day to keep
it holy. Don't do any work on the Sabbath.
Now, people make a work out of that. That's to teach us that
salvation is not by works. We have a commandment in the
Ten Commandments that remind us that we can't be saved by
our works. Honor your father and mother. Honor all authority. Thou shalt not kill. And that
means more than murder. You can kill somebody's character
speaking bad about them or not defending them. Thou shalt not
have committed adultery, all sexual sin, even in the mind,
because the Lord said someone who lusts in his heart after
a woman has committed adultery with her already in his heart.
Perfect purity of heart is what the law commands. Thou shalt
not steal. That's more than shoplifting.
What about robbing glory from God, taking credit where credit's
not due? Thou shalt not bear false witness. You're always to tell the truth.
And if all you tell is half the truth, you've told a whole lie.
Thou shalt not covet, thou shalt not desire what is thy neighbor.
Sin is the transgression of the law. Now, if you believe, before
I go on, if you believe that you've kept one commandment,
one of those ten I mentioned, If you believe you've kept one
commandment one time, you betray a complete ignorance of God's
holy law. You betray a complete ignorance
of yourself. You've never really been convicted
that you're a sinner. If you can look at God's holy
law and think, I kept that law, or I kept six of ten, or I kept
two of the ten. No, no, you have no understanding
of the law if you think that because all the law does is expose
sin. That's its purpose. It's to show
us that we are sinners, and Christ was numbered as a transgressor,
as a lawbreaker, one who broke God's holy law, yet he never
sinned. How can that be? Well, back in
Isaiah, once again, Isaiah 53, verse 6, we read, all we like
sheep have gone astray. We've turned everyone to his
own way. And the Lord hath laid upon him the iniquity of us all. Now that's why he was numbered
a transgressor, because the Lord laid upon him the iniquity of
us all. This is the glorious truth of
substitution. He took my place. All of the sins of all of God's
elect were laid upon Him. They were made to meet upon Him. The Scripture says who His own
self bear our sins in His own body on the tree. Now, you take
all the rays of the sun and cause them to be shone through one
magnifying glass and focused. That's how all of God's wrath
was focused upon the Lord Jesus Christ. You take all of the sins
of millions of people, all the debts of millions and millions
of people, and place them on one man. That's Christ bearing
the sins of all who believe, all the elect, all of his people.
The Lord laid on him the iniquity of us all. Who is the we and
the us of our text when Isaiah says, all we like sheep have
gone astray. We've turned everyone to our
own way and the Lord has laid upon him the iniquity of us all. Who's he talking about? Well,
it's in the text, sheep. There are goats and there are
sheep. The Lord made that distinction.
In Matthew chapter 25, where on judgment day, the goats shall
be separated from the sheep. The goats on the left hand, the
sheep on the right. The sheep saved, the goats cursed. Not everybody is a sheep. The
Lord said to the Pharisees, you believe not because you're not
of my sheep, as I said unto you. The sheep are those he laid down
his life for. They're dirty, they're dumb,
they're defenseless, and they easily go astray. And Isaiah
says, all we, every sheep will make this confession, all we
like sheep have gone astray. And every sheep believes there's
a particular aggravation about their guilt that makes them worse
than anybody else. Isaiah says, we've turned everyone
to his own way. There's a particular sinfulness
and willfulness about my sin where I've turned to my own way. How wicked. That's the confession
of the sheep. And the Lord hath laid upon him
the iniquity of us all. Everybody that Christ died for
believes themselves to be the chief of sinners. 1 Timothy 1.15,
Paul said, this is a faithful saying, worthy of all acceptation,
that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners of whom
I am chief. Now, it was for sinners that
Christ died. And the Lord laid upon him the
iniquity of us all. Now, the Lord Jesus always remained
pure, holy, harmless, undefiled. He never sinned. He didn't sin
when He was made sin, but He was made sin. Now, how could
that be fair? saw Him as spotless and pure
and innocent. How could He lay upon Him the
iniquity of us all so that He has made sin? And what all that
means, nobody knows. He drank the cup of the sins
of His people to where He bore their sins in His own body on
the tree, and He bore the full equivalent of hell, of separation
from God as the sinner's substitute. How could that be fair? How could
justice be served for God to take my sins and place them on
Christ? How could that be fair? Let me
give you four reasons how that can be fair. Number one, because
God did it. He hath laid upon Him the iniquity
of us all. God has all authority, and whatever
He does is right. Shall not the judge of the earth
do right? If God did it, it's right. You
can count on that. You don't need to worry about
God not being fair. God is absolutely just. Judgment
and justice are the habitation of His throne. And if He decides
to take my sins and lift them off me and place them upon His
Son, and if He takes the righteousness of His Son and places it upon
me so that I'm the very righteousness of God, it's fair because God
did it. For he hath made him to be sin,
who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of
God in him." It's fair, first of all, because God did it. Here's
the second reason it's fair. It's fair because Christ took
this on with full consent, willingly. Some years ago, somebody wrote
a book entitled, When Bad Things Happen to Good People. You may remember that book. Do
you know that only took place once? That only took place once. And it happened because he consented
for it to happen. He said, I lay down my life. I have power to lay it down.
I have power to take it up, this commandment of I received of
my father. He wasn't a victim. He took the sins of his people
willingly. He was not unwilling in this
thing. He was completely willing. Why did he do this? This is his
bride. And the husband takes the debt
of the bride. He loves the church and he gave
himself for it. He is going to save his church. He loves his church. He took
my sins and my sorrows and he made them his very own. Why?
Because he loved me. I stand amazed in the presence
of Jesus the Nazarene and wonder how he could love me, a sinner
condemned unclean. I'm so thankful he did though.
He took my sins and my sorrows. He made them his very own. He
bore the burden to Calvary and suffered and died alone. Praise
his holy name. He was paying the debts of his
bride. And in seeing this, we understand we're saved the same
way we were ruined. I was ruined in Adam. I was ruined
in what somebody else did. When he sinned, I sinned. I wasn't
around, but I was in his loins and I did it. And I was ruined
when he sinned. In Adam, all die, even so in
Christ shall all be made alive. Thank the Lord for that. Saved
the same way I was ruined. I was ruined by somebody else
and I'm saved by somebody else. He bore my sin. Now, Christ bore all the consequences
of sin. When my sin was laid upon him,
he was treated as the most evil man to ever live because my sins
really did become his sins. God didn't treat him as if He
was a great sinner. He was made sin, and God gave
him exactly what he deserved because my sin became his sin. You read Psalm 40. He doesn't
say Todd Naubert's iniquities as a heavy burden are too heavy
for me. He said my iniquities as a heavy
burden are too heavy for me. Somebody says, well, isn't that
David speaking? No, it's the Lord. You read In Hebrews chapter 10,
it's quoted as the direct words of the Lord. But my sin so truly
became His sin that He owned it as His own. Now, do I understand
that? No. I can't possibly understand
that, but I believe it. And this is my hope, that He
took my sin and my sorrows and made them His very own. He bore
the burden to Calvary and He suffered and died alone. He suffered
the full equivalent of hell. He bore unknown sufferings. And
there's a reason why the planet was covered with darkness when
he was hanging on the cross. This is to let us know that this
is a transaction between the Father and the Son, and you and
I will never really understand it. This is the only man, the
only holy man, who saw sin as God sees it. You and I don't
really see sin as God sees it. We're desensitized towards sin,
but he's not. And he saw the horrible evil
of sin, and he He was made sin and God actually forsook him.
He couldn't even call him father at this time. He said, my God,
my God, why hast thou forsaken me? He wasn't asking that because
he didn't know. He knew why God was forsaking
him because he was made sin. He was just crying this out.
So we would ask the question, why would God forsake this one? Because he was made sin. Now what happened as a result
of this glorious transaction of him being made sin and being
numbered as a transgressor? What happened as a result of
this? I say with joy, He took away
the sins that He was bearing. He made them to be no more. They were canceled. They were
blotted out, blotted out. They are no more. 1 John 3, 5 says He was manifested
to take away our sins, and in Him is no sin. That means if I'm in Him, I have
no sin. You see, His death was an accomplishment. Now, when man dies, we certainly
don't look at it as an accomplishment. It's because of sin. But when
He died, It was an accomplishment. That's the reason he came. He came to die. He came to live.
He came to die. And when he died, it was an accomplishment. He said, I finished the work
that thou gavest me to do. This is the will of him that
sent me, that of all which he hath given me I should lose nothing,
but raise it up again at the last day. He redeemed all of
the elect. Now that's what his accomplishment
was. When he was numbered as a transgressor and died under
the wrath of God. He made full redemption for all
the elect. All of their sins were paid for. Now, would you please listen
real carefully? If you tell me that there are
people suffering in hell for whom he died, I don't know if
you realize it, but you say his death wasn't enough to save him. I want you to think about that. That's what most preachers preach.
He died for everybody. He made salvation available for
everybody. He paid for everybody's sins, and now it's up to you
as to whether or not you'll accept him, as to whether or not this
is going to work for you. Now, when you make that statement,
what you're saying is, is his death It's not enough to save those
people in hell. There's something they needed to do. And what that's doing is making
the death of Christ meaningless. It's a failure to preach the
gospel. It's actually a message of salvation
by works to say that Jesus Christ died for everybody's sins without
exception. If I say that, I am not preaching
the gospel. I'm making the death of Christ
meaningless, absolutely meaningless. Universal redemption, saying
that Christ died universally for all men makes God unjust. He charges for the same sin twice. first on Christ and then on the
person who doesn't do whatever it is they're supposed to do
to save themselves, and it makes the blood of Christ absolutely
meaningless. If Christ died for all men the
same, if he died for Judah's sin and Peter's sin, what does
the blood of Christ have to do with salvation? Nothing. Nothing. Not if he died for people in
hell. It makes his death meaningless. He accomplished something in
his death. Now, Christ did not bear everybody's
sin. Did he bear yours? Did he bear
yours? Well, how do you fit into this
text where it says, all we like sheep have gone astray? A sheep going astray, he cannot
find his way back. All we like sheep have gone astray. And you see a particular aggravation
about your own personal sin. There's nobody like you. Oh,
we like sheep have gone astray. We've turned everyone to his
own way. It's all our fault. There's a
particular sinfulness about our sin. We've gone our own way,
and we are the chief of sinners totally dependent upon the shepherd
coming after us. You see, If you're like a sheep
gone astray and you've turned your own way, your only hope
is the Lord laying upon Him your iniquity, and Him dealing with
it, and Him putting it away, and Him calling you back by His
invincible, irresistible grace, the shepherd going after the
sheep. David said in Psalm 119, the last verse, I've gone astray
like a lost sheep. Seek thy servant. Now that's
the person for whom he died, the person who sees himself to
be a sinner. Romans chapter 5 verse 6 says,
For when we were yet without strength, not just weak, without
strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. Who did
He die for? Those who are without strength
and those who are ungodly. Now let me tell you this, if
Christ died for you, you can't run the risk of the hazard of
the possibility of being anything but saved. Now what amazing love
that God would give His Son to die for sinners. Here it is love
not that we love God but that He loved us and sent His Son
to be the propitiation for our sins What amazing love of the
Son that He would come for us. 2 Corinthians 8, 9 says, You
know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich,
yet for your sakes He became poor, that you through His poverty
might be rich. And what security we have. If
Christ died for me, I can't be anything but saved. and what
a reason to give myself to him. Were the whole realm of nature
mine, that were present far too small. Love so amazing, so divine,
demands my soul, my life, my all. Now we have this message
on DVD and CD. If you call the church right
or email, we'll send you a copy. This is Todd Kniper praying God
will be pleased to make Himself known to you. Amen. To request
a copy of the sermon you have just heard, send your request
to messages at toddsroadgracechurch.com. Or you may write or call the
church at the information provided on the screen.