It's good to be with you. I spoke
to your pastor this morning. He's enjoying his vacation in
Arizona. As far as I'm concerned, he can
have it, but he's enjoying it. I talk to Evelyn Wayne fairly
frequently by email. She sends her regards. She's
working on translating sermons. I have them translated into Chinese
and Mandarin, I think, is the language. So she sends her greetings
to you as well. It is good, very good, to be
with you. Come with me, if you will, to
the book of Exodus. Exodus chapter 21. At your leisure, I urge you
to read Exodus 19 through 23 at one sitting. In these chapters,
you have the giving of the law. In chapter 19, Moses brings the
children of Israel to the edge of the Mount Sinai, and God calls
Moses up into the Mount. Now, you understand in this place,
you are well taught, the purpose of the law was that it should
be our schoolmaster unto Christ. Once Christ has come, we're no
longer under the schoolmaster. But the law was given to be our
schoolmaster unto Jesus Christ. It is to show us our need of
a substitute, our need of a Redeemer, our need of someone to represent
us before God, to obey God in our room instead for us, and
to satisfy all the demands of justice for our offenses against
Him. In Exodus 19, when Moses is called
by God up to the mount, he gave specific instructions. He said,
don't let any man in Israel, or even a beast, touch the mount. If you put your hand here, God
said, I'll kill you. If you touch this thing, I'll
kill you. Now understand the teaching of
Scripture. You put your hand to the business
of reconciling yourself to God, you'll go to hell for it. That's
the reason God killed Uzzah when he put his hand on the ark. He
put his hand to God's salvation, and God killed him. You put your
hand to the work, God will send you to hell for it. In chapter
20, it gives us what is commonly called the moral law, the Ten
Commandments. The law which sets forth the
first and chief commandment that we should love God with all our
heart, soul, mind, and being, and our neighbor as ourself,
the second commandment. It gives it to us on two tables
of the law. And when the children of Israel
received this word from God, they said to Moses, they said,
Moses, you speak to God for us, don't let God speak to us. And
Moses put a veil over his face as he came down from the mount
to speak to Israel as God's representative, and went back to the mount to
speak to God as Israel's representative, thus typifying Christ our Mediator. Just after giving the Ten Commandments,
what's called the moral law, representing all that God demands
of man, perfect love to God and perfect love to your neighbor.
He gives us a picture of grace. He says, come to me, but don't
come to me on an altar that you built. You come to me on an altar
of earth, but the altar of earth is not so pretty. Come to me
on an altar of earth, an altar of God's making. And if you must
have an altar of stone, make sure it's not hewn stone. Make
sure it's a rock out of the earth, just like it was made in the
earth. And don't put steps on it, lest you ascend by degrees
to God's altar. Because when you seek to come
to God by degrees, you do nothing but expose your nakedness, your
sin, and your shame. And if you lift up your tool
upon this altar, you will have polluted the altar and defiled
everything, and God will send you to hell for it. Then in chapter
21, he begins to give that which is called the civil law, these
civil statutes given to Israel. Now understand these things with
regard to the law. The whole law, beginning in chapter
19, going through the rest of the ceremonial laws, the civil
laws, and the moral law given in Israel, was given to Israel
alone. It was never given to any Gentile
people. never inculcated upon any Gentile
people, Old Testament or new. It was given to Israel alone,
and it was intended and given for the purpose of directing
our attention to Christ, showing our need of Christ, and showing
us how the Lord Jesus Christ would accomplish redemption,
salvation, and grace for us as our representative. Here in Exodus
chapter 21, let's begin reading at verse 1. Here is the very
first of the civil laws, and what a blessed picture we have
here. Now these are the judgments, the statutes, which thou shalt
set before them. If thou buy an Hebrew servant,
six years shall he serve thee, or he shall serve, and in the
seventh he shall go out free for nothing. If he came in by
himself, he shall go out by himself. If he were married, then his
wife shall go out with him. If his master hath given him
a wife, and she hath borne him sons or daughters, the wife and
her children shall be her masters, and he shall go out by himself.
And if the servant shall plainly say, I love my master, my wife,
and my children, I will not go out free, then his master shall
bring him unto the judges, He shall also bring him to the door
or unto the doorpost, and his master shall bore his ear through
with an awe, and he shall serve him forever." This law describes
a man, a man who voluntarily makes himself a bondservant to
his master and a bondservant for life. That man is Jesus Christ,
our Redeemer, and that's my subject. Christ the Servant, Christ Jehovah's
Servant, Christ the Servant of God for us. The Lord Jesus, the
Son of God, became the Servant of God that he might redeem and
save sinners chosen of God from the foundation of the world.
This is what our Lord says concerning himself. I came not to be ministered
unto. I came not to be served, but
to minister, to serve, and to give my life a ransom for many."
How blessed it is to see our Lord Jesus Christ here at the
very outset of the giving of the law, set before us as He
alone who can obey the law and fulfill the law and serve God
and be accepted of God as His servant. Let me show you four
or five things concerning Christ, our servant. Number one, the
Lord Jesus chose to become Jehovah's servant. We understand and rejoice
to know that this servant is himself God, one with the Father,
in being, in glory, and in greatness, in all things equal with the
Father in his eternal deity. but he who is God the Son voluntarily
became the servant of God that he might save our souls. There
was nothing that forced him into servitude, no constraint upon
him, no compelling him to become Jehovah's servant, but rather
he volunteers for the task of standing forth as our substitute,
our covenant shelter, and thus as Jehovah's servant. You know
the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet
for our sakes He became poor, that we, through His poverty,
might be made rich. The Lord Jesus, for our sakes,
emptied Himself. He became of no reputation. He
took on him the form of a servant, and was found in likeness as
a man. And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself
still more, and became obedient unto death, even the death of
the cross. And all this he did as Jehovah's
servant, that he might redeem and save his people." These are
words of unspeakable importance. Much, very much depends on a
right understanding of this. The Son of God is and must be
God, the second person of the Trinity. I'll ask you to turn
to a passage I've often asked you to turn to, 1 John 5, verse
7. 1 John 5, verse 7. Your pastor and I discuss this
often. We live in an age when everybody is getting some kind
of a newfangled version of the Scriptures. If you go to one
of these religious idol shops, they call them religious bookstores,
and you look around the religious trinkets for a Bible, you will
be hard-pressed to find a King James Version of Scripture. How
come? Because men are convinced that
they can somehow or another, by changing the wording of Scripture,
make it sound better and be more appealing to men. We want a more
modern translation. When I was in England a couple
of years ago, we were sitting around chatting one night, and
an old man, Brother Sid Buggins, the folks who talk about these
modern translations, they're real popular over there too.
He said, you know, I hear the thing about doing that with Shakespeare,
make it more readable. And folks just gasped. Well, that'd be horrible. Shakespeare's
just fine the way he is. Point well made. But there are
better reasons than just objecting to changing the language to modern
language and so on. In the King James translation,
this one verse of scripture, this one verse, is the only single
verse that clearly states the doctrine of the Trinity which
is so vital to all gospel truth. It is declared in many places.
It is set forth in many places. Here alone it is stated. And all modern translations,
all of them, leave it out. Some of them do actually put
a footnote and say, well, some folks suggested it ought to be
here, but it ought not be. Because it's not in the preponderance
of text in the various manuscripts that are found. And the fact
is, it was never left out of any translation until, I think
it was Jerome who left it out of one of his translations. No,
it wasn't Jerome. Erasmus left it out of one of his translations
and immediately corrected it. But those who denied the Trinity
jumped on it quickly. Listen to what John says. There
are three that bear record in heaven. The Father, the Word,
and the Holy Ghost. And these three are one. Now
I have read, I can't tell you, how many volumes written by theologians
explaining the Trinity. And you know what I found? Every
one I ever read, as well as ones I wrote, confuses what John has
to say right here. It's not stated any better. There
are three that bear record in heaven. God the Father, God the
Son who is the Word, who stands forth as the communication of
God, the wisdom of God, the revelation of God, God the Holy Ghost, and
these three are one. Here, O Israel, the Lord our
God is one Lord, and he who is Jehovah's servant, if he renders
service to Jehovah that will be effectual and meritorious
for all his people, he must himself be the infinite God. And yet
he must be a man, a real man. Our Lord Jesus Christ therefore
assumed our nature, took our nature into union with himself
and became one of us. We say he assumed our nature. I just use that word. We say
he took upon him our nature. And folks are very, very careful.
They say we don't want to imply that God became a man. Oh. Hmm. I wonder what's wrong with
that implication. This is what the book says. The
Word was made flesh and dwelt among us. Is that what the book
says? The book doesn't say the Word assumed flesh. The word
took flesh, the word was made flesh, so that when the man,
Christ Jesus, died in our stead at Calvary, God redeemed the
church with his own blood. Acts 20, 28. He who is Jehovah's
servant, then, is the infinite God in human flesh, representing
us. He gave himself for us. freely
and voluntarily. He loved the church and gave
himself for it freely and voluntarily. He declares, as the Father knoweth
me, even so know I the Father, and I lay down my life for the
sheep. Turn to John chapter 10. John the 10th chapter. He who is our substitute and
our Redeemer, He who is Jehovah's servant, as represented here
in the law, and Jehovah's servant forever, the only one who really
could obey God, the only one who really could satisfy justice,
he must be a voluntary servant. John chapter 10, verse 16. Our
Savior says, Other sheep I have which are not of this fold, them
also I must breed. Must? How is it that he must
do anything? He agreed to it. His father commended
it because he's Jehovah's servant. And they shall hear my voice
and there shall be one fold and one shepherd. Therefore doth
my father love me. What did he say? Therefore doth
my father love me? Did the father not love the son
before this? Of course he did. But he speaks
here as Jehovah's servant. He speaks here as a man who has
earned God's love by his obedience. A man who has merited the love
of the triune God by what he does. Therefore doth my father
love me, because I laid down my life that I might take it
again. And you know what it said in John chapter 17? He says,
thou hast loved them as thou hast loved me. That means Tom
Shuler loves you for the same reason he loves his son. Because
his son earned for you the love of God. Because in his son you earned
the love of God. Thy obedience unto God perfectly. No man taketh it from me, but
I lay it down in myself. I have power to lay it down,
and I have power to take it again. This commandment have I received
from my Father. The Father gave commandment,
the Son gave obedience, and the Father therefore loves the Son. Turn to Isaiah chapter 50. Isaiah
chapter 50. The Lord God said, Behold My
servant. whom I uphold, mine elect, in
whom my soul delighteth. I put my spirit upon him. He
shall bring forth judgment, righteousness, justice to the Gentiles. He shall
not cry, nor lift up, nor cause his voice to be heard in the
street. He shall not fail." Now listen to how the servant describes
himself. Isaiah 50, verse 5. The Lord God hath opened mine
ear, and I was not rebellious. Neither turned away back, I gave
my back to the smiters, and my cheeks to them that plucked off
the hair. I hid not my face from shame and spitting, for the Lord
God will help me. Therefore shall I not be confounded,
therefore have I set my face like a flint, and I know that
I shall not be ashamed." All right, that's the first point.
Our Savior is Jehovah's voluntary servant. Second point, He served. From the moment he stood forth
as our mediator. The scripture speaks of a time
before time called in the beginning. In the beginning was the word.
And then everything was created by him. From the foundation of
the world. The Lord Jesus stood forth as
our representative, as our covenant surety, as the Word of God, assumed
total responsibility for our souls, pledged himself to redeem
and save his people, and bring us at last unto glory. And the
Father accepted him as our mediator, as the Lamb slain from the foundation
of the world, and accepted us in him. And from the time that
he stood forth in old eternity and lifted his hand, he said,
Lo, I come to do thy will, O my God. You can read it in Psalm
40, and you know it's talking about him because Paul says so
in Hebrews chapter 2. It's written to me in the volume
of the book, in the book of your decrees, in the book of the prophets.
It's written to me. I delight to do thy will. Oh,
my God. And from that time until this
day, he is Jehovah's Servant serving the Father. When our
Lord Jesus finished his work on the earth, he said, I finished
the work thou gavest me to do. Now glorify thou me with thine
own self, with the glory that I had with thee before the world
was. Give me now manifestly that which
you gave me as the covenant surety when I was accepted in eternity."
And the Father put all things into his hands manifestly, making
him the ruler and king over everything. And our Lord Jesus, in the fullness
of time, came into the womb of the Virgin, in that body prepared
for him by God the Holy Spirit, and he said, Lo, I come to do
thy will. And when he broke his mother's
womb, he said, Lo, I come to do thy will, O God. And from
the day he came into the world to the day he cried, It is finished,
and bowed his head and gave up the ghost, saying, Father, into
thy hands I commit my spirit. He served his Father for us. All his days doing the will of
God. Back in our text, Exodus chapter
21, verse 2. If thou buy an Hebrew servant,
six years shall he serve, and the seventh he shall go out free
for nothing." That's a good Southern statement. Used that a lot when
I was a boy. Free for nothing. Free for nothing. How long could
he serve? Six years. Now, I'm not one to
place a great deal of emphasis on numerology. But some numbers
clearly are used in scriptures for specific purpose. Three frequently
is used, clearly representing the Trinity. The number six is
used throughout scripture as representing man. It is a representation
of humanity. It is a number for man. It is
a number for frustration. It is a number for fickleness. It is a number for failure. Do you remember the mock of the
beast? Six. Six. Six. Don't be afraid of that. It's
called failure. Frustration. It's the number
of man. It's the number of man. Man was
created on the sixth day. He comes to serve for six years,
no longer. And our Lord Jesus Christ, God's
Servant, served the full age of a man for man. When he was a boy, that boy who
loved his mother like no boy ever loved a mother, that boy
who honored his mother like no boy ever honored a mother, he
corrected her. He said, wish ye not that I must
be about my father's business. I have one to serve whose honor
is more important than yours, whose will is more important
than yours. And I must be about my father's business. When he
walked on this earth, our Lord Jesus, in the days of his life
on this earth, walked before God, obeying the Father in all
things. And when he left the earth, the
Father testified, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well
pleased. Our Savior, the Servant of God,
as a man, fulfilled the law perfectly, bringing in everlasting righteousness
for us. I don't know how to state this
more clearly than has been stated by your pastor or myself or others
in the past. But these days there are some
fellows who seem to think they're smarter than God, and they make
little of the obedience of Christ in this world, and talk about
His obedience as though it has nothing to do with our salvation.
While our Lord lived in this body of flesh on this earth,
in His humiliation, He worked out a righteousness called the
righteousness of God for His people. He didn't need to do
it for himself, Mitch, he did it for us. He was all those 33
years weaving a spotless garment called a robe of righteousness
for his people. And it is that righteousness
that is imputed to us in free justification when God Almighty
looks on us and places the robe of his Son on us. This is called
the righteousness of the saints in the book of Revelation. fine
linen, clean and white. But that righteous obedience
of Christ would never bring us to glory. Sin must be paid for. Justice must be satisfied. When
our Lord Jesus died at Calvary, He satisfied all the demands
of divine justice for us by the sacrifice of Himself. And when
it comes in free grace, in regenerating mercy, He comes and puts in us
Himself, His own righteousness. Now, understand this. A righteous
record cannot be imparted to anybody. Here it is written down
here. Say, well, I don't believe that's
imparted to anybody. You'd have a tough time sticking
that in me. It can't be imparted to anyone. That's not what we
mean, not at all. Oh, no. Christ is our righteousness. And in the new birth, He comes
and takes up residence in you permanently. Christ is that righteousness
imparted to us. He is that holiness without which
no man shall see the Lord. And while our Lord walked on
this earth, He taught us how to serve God. Every now and then folks get
to feeling real pious and they'll come to the pastor and they'll
say, what can I do to serve the Lord? Oh, reckon what Don Williams
can do to start serving God. Reckon what he can do. Our Lord Jesus on one occasion
took a bowl of water and a towel and he washed his disciples'
feet. And he wiped their feet with
that towel. And he said, no, that's how you serve each other.
And that's how you serve God. I've given you an example. You
should do as I've done to you. How do you serve God? By loving
and caring for His people. That's how you do it. That's
how you do it. Not by acting religious. Not by acting pious. Not by putting
on a show that people applaud, but you see somebody who's It
looks like you could do with a drink of water, have some.
That's it. Our Lord said, whoso offers a
cup of cold water in the name of a disciple shall not lose
his reward. That's it. You serve God by serving
one another, serving his people for the glory of his name, ministering
to one another's needs. But notice this. Here's the third
thing. Back in our text today, the servant
had an option. Had he chosen to do so, he could
have gone out free. Our blessed Savior could have
gone out free. After six years, the Master had
to let him go by law. Had to let him go free for nothing.
He couldn't stop him. Unless the servant chose otherwise.
Our Lord Jesus had the choice whether he remained a servant
or went out free, even after he came into this world. Living
here as a man, perfectly honoring and pleasing his father, when
he came to Gethsemane, as he prayed, if it be possible, let
this cup pass from me, and his sweat, as it were, great drops
of blood falling to the ground. Before that happened, do you
remember what he said to Peter? When Peter cut off the high priest's
servant's ear and he put it back on, he said, don't you know,
Peter, I could right now call my father, and he would send
legions of angels to set me free. There's nobody forcing me here.
There's nobody forcing my hand. I'm here doing this, enduring
this, because this is what I agreed to, and this is what I want to
do. He said, I have a baptism to
be baptized with, and I'm straightened till it be accomplished. The
Lord Jesus, O my soul, He went to Calvary as Jehovah's servant
in my room instead. with greater eagerness than a
thirsty man ever drank cold water in the history of mankind. But had he gone out free, he had to go out by himself. Here's the fourth point. Our
Lord would not go out by himself. Look at verse 5 in our text.
If the servant shall plainly say, I love my master, what's
the order? I love my wife, I love my children,
because I love my master. Because I love my wife, because
I love my children, I will not go out free. Now is my soul he said, even
unto death. What shall I say? Father, save
me from this hour? Oh, no. For this cause came I
unto this hour. Father, glorify thy name. And a voice was heard from heaven
saying, I have both glorified it and will glorify it yet again. Our Lord Jesus would not go out
free, because he said, I love my master. He came here to establish God's
glory in his creation. The first Adam was created for
the glory of God, and he miserably failed. The last Adam succeeded
gloriously. He came here with no work, no
ambition, no will, but to do his Father's will. In John chapter
4, he said to his disciples, he said, I have bread to eat
you don't know anything about. I've come to do my Father's will.
By his glorifying of the Father, We are saved with an everlasting
salvation and eternally justified. Next, the servant says, I love
my wife. You who are loved of Christ can't
fail to see your beloved here, can you? David said to Jonathan, thy love
to me is wonderful. Oh, I pray that he will cause
you and me and to know the unknowable, that the Christ may dwell in
your hearts by faith, that you, being rooted and grounded in
love, may be able to comprehend with all faiths what is the breadth
and length and depth and height, and to know the love of Christ
which passeth knowledge, that you might be filled with all
the fullness of God." Where can we find illustration of His love? loved Rachel. And he served Laban
for Rachel for seven years. And I don't have any idea how
Laban pulled it off, but he tripped it. After seven years, Jacob
got Leah. And you know what he did? Joe,
he served another seven years. And he got Rachel, he said, it
just seemed like a day. Just a day. Just a day. But there's
a better picture than that. In the garden, the Holy Spirit
tells us in 1 Timothy chapter 4, that Adam was not deceived. Adam was not deceived. When Eve
took that forbidden fruit being deceived, She took the fruit
and it appeared that nothing happened. Her eyes were not opened. She didn't see that she was naked.
She didn't have any sense of guilt and condemnation. She didn't
have any dread of God. Her conscience was not awakened
to any sense of guilt. But Adam knew what was going
on. Adam knew where Eve was. Adam knew what Eve had done.
And he knew the consequences of taking that fruit from her
hand. But rather than lose her, Adam willingly plunged himself
and all his race into death and darkness, and separation from
God, and sin, and guilt, and condemnation. Now listen to me. The last Adam,
rather than that he should lose his wife and his children, willingly
plunged himself into sin and darkness and death and the curse
and condemnation because he said, I love my wife, I love my children,
I will not go out free. Thomas Bradbury wrote this, I
thought it was outstanding, through the perfection of his righteousness
the preciousness of his blood, the power of his resurrection,
and the prevalency of his intercession, he brings forth the progeny of
grace, his seed, a seed to serve him from the womb of the eternal
purpose, to serve, praise, and adore the eternal three-in-one
to all generations. Now, here's the fifth thing. Look at verse six, the last line. He shall serve forever. Forever. How delightful, how blessed it
is to my heart To see the willingness, the delight of Christ to bow,
to humble Himself, to become obedient to His Father's will,
to suffer and die in our stead. Oh, how He loved us. He said,
I will not go out free. And He had His ear bored and
He declared Himself to be Jehovah's servant forever. And He serves
Jehovah by serving us forever. Forever. He served us all the days of
His humanity. And the Father put all things
in His hands. Gave Him power over all flesh
to give eternal life to as many as the Father had given Him from
eternity. And oh, how He serves us. The psalmist said, He performeth
all things for me. He performeth all things for
me. He intercedes. for us in heaven's
glory, in that body with which He served Jehovah on the earth,
until at last He bore our sins away in His body on the tree. He now sits upon the throne of
glory and rules the universe for us, intercedes for us. There sits yonder on the mercy
seat. There sits at the right hand
of the majesty on high a man. A man there is, a real man. The God, how bright he shines. A man with a real human heart
that feels everything I feel. With real human hands with which
he served the Lord. Real human feet. with which he
walked on this earth, real human passions and emotions, such as
you have now, who's touched with the feeling of our infirmities. There is no pain known to humanity. He doesn't know better than any
man knows. He's touched with the feeling
of our infirmities. He brought in everlasting righteousness
for us. He put away our sins by the sacrifice
of Himself. He lives to make intercession
for us. He sends His Spirit to fetch His own at the appointed
time of love and keeps and preserves them, believing, giving them
faith continually. unto the end of his days. I hear from a fellow out in Tenpey,
Arizona, a Jim Jimsock. I don't hear from
him very often, but every now and then. He used to be a professional
golfer. Had an accident, lost his right
arm, and now he makes ping golf clubs out in Tenpey, Arizona.
Every note I get from him, no matter how long or how short,
he signs it this way, in his grip. That's where I am, in his grip. And the reason I continue believing
is because I'm in his grip. And the reason you continue to
follow him is because you're in his grip, and he won't let
you go. If he lets you go, Dwayne, You'd
walk out the door and never come back. That all takes some starch out
of us, shouldn't it? And soon, He'll come again to
receive us unto Himself. Now, in Luke, chapter 12, our
Lord speaks of the coming of the bridegroom. My dear friend, Brother Hubert
Montgomery, is with the Lord now. On three different occasions,
when we have Scripture reading in the office, on three different
occasions, he read one solitary verse of Scripture. And he'd
look up at me and run down to his cheeks and say, I sure wish
I knew something about that. Isaiah 40, verse 2. She shall
receive of the Lord's hand double for all her sins. John 11, verse
40, "...if thou wouldest believe, thou shouldest see the glory
of God." And Luke 12, verse 37, "...blessed are those servants
whom the Lord, when he cometh, shall find watching. Verily I
say unto you, that he shall gird himself and make them set down to meet. And will come forth and serve them. In the ages to come, our God
will show the exceeding riches of His grace and His kindness
toward us through Christ Jesus. And when time shall be no more,
the Lamb in the midst of the throne, will feed us and lead
us to fountains of living water, and bless us with eternal joy
in His presence. And glorify God, serving us forever. O God, give me grace then. to
serve Him by serving you. Amen.