Well, it's good to look out and
see some familiar faces. It was kind of strange down there
in Mexico. Well, strange, it was amazing. But to look out and, you know,
not see anybody except for Matt and Mark that you knew and not
even speak their language, it's kind of intimidating. But Cody
did a good job. And it was also good to know
that we might not have known each other, spoke the same language,
but they were my brothers and sisters in Christ. And to know
that we had the same hope that we were all looking to Christ
was a blessing. So it was a blessing. I brought
a message down here and we'll bring it here tonight. John,
chapter one. John, chapter one, let's read
verses 29 through 36. The next day, John sees Jesus coming
unto him and says, Behold, the Lamb of God, which taketh away
the sin of the world. This is he of whom I said, After
me cometh a man which is preferred before me, for he was before
me, and I knew him not, but that he should be made manifest to
Israel Therefore am I come baptizing with water and John bear record
saying I saw the spirit descending from heaven like a dove and it
abode upon him and I knew him not. But he that sent me to baptize
with water the same said unto me upon whom thou shalt see the
spirit descending and remaining on him the same as he which baptizes
with the Holy Ghost. And I saw and bear record that
this is the son of God. Again, the next day after John
stood and two of his disciples and looking upon Jesus as he
walked, he said, Behold, the Lamb of God. That's the message
of this or the title of this message is Behold, the Lamb of
God. I'm going to. Just look at verse twenty nine,
the last phrase of verse twenty nine, Behold, the Lamb of God,
which takes away the sin of the world. I'm going to ask three
questions from that phrase, and we'll start at the end of the
verse and work backwards. Whose sin is taken away? Who
takes away this sin? And lastly, how can I have my
sins taken away? So we'll just start right the
last part of the phrase, which take away the sin of the world.
And I'm pretty sure everybody in this room knows that Christ
did not die for the whole world. He died for his people. And a
lot of people like to take one or two verses that have the world
in it and just say that he died for everybody. But you can't
take one verse that doesn't line up with the rest of scriptures
and base something on that. We can see daily that there's
men living in this world that don't follow Christ, that live
after their own selves, have no interest in the gospel and
have no interest in Christ, and they die and they go to hell.
There's a place called hell and there's people going there daily.
But more importantly, the word of God says that he died for
an elect people. And I want to just look at scripture.
There's lots of scripture. I'm going to pull a little one
out on you out of Micah. So good luck finding that one.
It's right after Jonah, which is even smaller than Micah. I
don't know if that helped. Micah chapter seven. It's about six or seven books
right in front of Matthew, Micah chapter seven. We'll read a couple
of verses here and we're going to look at who the Lord says
who he died for. Micah seven verses 18 and 19. Who is a God like unto thee that
pardoneth iniquity and passeth by the transgression of the remnant
of his heritage? He retaineth not his anger forever
because he delighteth in mercy. He will turn again. He will have
compassion upon us. He will subdue our iniquities
and that will cast all their sins into the depths of the sea.
Notice in verse 18 passes by the transgression of the remnant
of his heritage, a remnant, a chosen people out of this world. And
verse 19 continues on that chosen people described as us. He will
have compassion upon us. It's also our he will subdue
our iniquities. that will cast all of their sins,
us, our, their, particular people. And it's like that throughout
all the scriptures. Now, these people come from all over the
world. Revelation 5, verse 9 says, out of all kindred, tongue, people,
and tribes, and from all nationalities, American, Mexican, European,
Asian, African, just all countries. And all occupations, maintenance
men, teachers, doctors, popcorn makers. He he takes an elect
people out of the whole world. And the Lord has no respect of
persons. If your upbringing, your occupation,
your standing in society has nothing to do with how he looks
to you, what moves him as a sinner coming to him for mercy. That's
it. Don't get caught up on people all acting all high and religious
like they're more meant for God or whatever. He will not turn
away a sinner that comes to him for mercy, period. It's in the
scriptures. He delights in mercy. And that's
what moves him. Now, a natural man despises election
because it takes salvation out of man's hand and puts it into
God's hand, which is where I would rather it Be myself, you know,
we don't want nothing in our hands. But and the new man, the
new man that he creates loves election because he sees that
if God didn't choose him, he never would have or could have
chosen God. Election does not limit salvation. It brings salvation to people
that could not save themselves. So election is a is a good doctrine. It gives hope to sinners that
cannot save themselves. And these centers rejoicing and
Todd always speak to this verse, whosoever will let him take the
water life freely. I kind of like that word whosoever
a lot to. There's no qualifications to
it, there's no strings attached. Just whosoever will come to Christ
and ask for mercy, he will save and cleanse. So anyone can be
a whosoever. Whosoever comes to Christ and
ask for mercy is elect. Don't try to figure out who's
elect and then work it the other way. Come to Christ and you're
elect. That's plain and simple. And
whoever comes to him, he takes their sins away. Just as Anne
sang their first line of that song was rejoicing the Lord for
Christ who took our sins away. And that's that's the blessing.
And I want to take away something. Let's look at that real quick.
Jeremiah. Jeremiah, chapter 50. Let's see what to take away in
scriptures actually means or how it's described. In here,
Jeremiah 50 verse 20. Jeremiah 50 verse 20. In those days and in that time,
said the Lord, the iniquity of Israel shall be sought for and
there shall be none and the sins of Judah And they shall not be
found, for I will pardon them whom I reserve." Right there
is a simple explanation. The sins are gone, none, not
to be found. They're disappeared. Well, that's
what take away, it's actually kind of like the opposite of
create. When you, or when God creates something, He takes nothing
and makes it something. When He takes away something,
He takes something and makes it nothing. And only God can
do this. We can't create. We can't take
away. Only God can do this, and that's an act of His grace. So
that's what take away is. It means your sins are just completely
gone, disappeared, and right there for those whom I reserve
for His elect. So we looked at the first question. Whose sins are taken away? His
chosen people. Anyone that comes to Him, any
sinner coming to Him for mercy. And the next question is, who
takes away the sin of the elect? And our text said, behold, the
Lamb of God, the Lamb of God, the Lord Jesus Christ is who
takes away the sins of his people. Now, he's the eternal lamb. He's
always he's always been a lamb slain from the foundation of
the world. He was the lamb slain in type in the Old Testament,
all the sacrifices and all the pictures in the Old Testament.
He was a lamb slain on the cross in the New Testament. He's a
lamb in heaven right now receiving glory from the hosts praising
his name. He's the eternal lamb. I'm not
going to turn to these books, but Exodus 29 speaks of a morning
and evening sacrificial lamb every morning. Every evening,
the priest would sacrifice a lamb for the people. And, you know,
you can look at it this way. When you wake up in the morning,
wake up relying on Christ. When you go to bed at night,
go to bed relying on Christ every day. Don't rely on yesterday's
faith. Go to Christ for new faith every
day. Hebrews 10 verse 20 speaks of
a new and living way. New coming from the word for
freshly slaughtered. Christ's blood is effective.
And every day don't. Don't get hung up on yesterday's
faith and you wake up and it's not as good and you search for
how good you felt yesterday. Seek Christ daily and he will
give you new faith. He's also the Passover lamb in
Exodus chapter 12. Just as Israel dwelt in the houses
with the blood on the doorposts and they were safe. Every sinner
that comes to Christ and dwells in him through faith is safe
because of his blood shed on the cross for your sins, and
he put them away. And God took his wrath out on
the lamb on that cross and your sins are put away in him. And
you have no sin left to have wrath taken out for. God cannot
punish twice. He punished Christ once. And
all that were punished in Christ are saved and free and have their
sins taken away. Lambs, they also use lambs for
food and clothing. Now we see Christ as our spiritual
food and our spiritual clothing. He's what a believer feeds on. As we're doing this now and this
morning, Christ is the bread of life. Believers assemble together
to hear the word preached. And that's what gives Life and
maintained life in a believer is a spiritual food of Christ
relying on him. And he's our clothing. He's our
righteousness. He's Revelation 19 speaks of
arrayed in fine linen, clean and white, which is the righteousness
of saints. So he's our spiritual food and
our clothing as a lamb would provide them. But he's also he's
the eternal lamb. He's always existed in the eternal
covenant of grace. He God and Christ agreed before
time again, before the world was formed, that he would come
as a lamb and he would take the sins of his people and die on
that cross. And what Christ agreed to must
surely happen because he's God and he cannot lie. And what he
purposes, he carries out. So he's the eternal lamb. Now,
all lambs are owned by someone. You see him in the flocks and
in the In the pastures, so whose land was this land where he's
the land of God. And I want to look at that in
Genesis 22. We'll look at one verse. Genesis
22, speaking about whose land this is. Genesis 22, verse eight. And Abraham said. My son, God
will provide himself a lamb for a burnt offering. So they went
both of them together. So here we have in this verse,
God providing himself a lamb. And this you can look at this
in three ways. God himself provides the land. God is the. He's the purpose
behind the lamb, and he carried it all out, so he himself provided
the lamb. Now he provided the lamb to himself. Christ did not die to please
me and you and to satisfy. He died to satisfy his father.
And his father was satisfied in him. And every believer that
trusts Christ is satisfied in Christ. And so he died to provide
the sacrifice to himself to appease his father. But the most amazing
provision of this is that he got himself is the land. And that's just beyond. Our comprehension, if you would
try to sit down and think how God Almighty that created everything
and fills everything just beyond what we can even imagine was
contained in the body of Christ as a land. That's amazing grace
and that's amazing love that he would do that for his people,
for sinners like you and me. It's just almost too much to
fathom that he would do that. And I'm not going to sit up here
and try to explain it, but I will believe it. And I will rejoice
in it. And so that verse sums up. Salvation. By grace, it says, everything
God requires of you, He provides for you in Christ, the Lamb of
God. And, you know, sometimes salvation
seems far away from you. You've had a long, bad day, and
you haven't even thought about Christ, and you've had a rough
time when you come home to your family, and it's just been a
miserable day, you know. All it takes is one look to him
hanging on that cross. And you can see the love that
he had for you and the love you should have for him, for what
he's done for you. It's amazing, amazing love. So we've seen whose sins are
taken away, the elect, chosen out of the world. We've seen
who takes away these sins, the Lamb of God. And let's look at
the last question. How can my sins be taken away?
Let's look back at our text, John, chapter one. And the answer is, as always,
in the scriptures, there's the answer to everything is in the
scriptures, I believe, but here's the answer to this question,
how can my sins be taken away? Let's look down at verse 36. First, four words. And looking
upon Jesus, look and believe. If you would have your sins taken
away, look and believe on Christ. It's that simple. That's the
command of the gospel. And that's the work of all works,
is to look and believe on Christ. Let's look at that in Scripture.
John 6, turn over a couple of pages. Let's read verses 28 and 29. Then said they unto him, What
shall we do that we might work the works of God? Jesus answered
and said unto them, This is the work of God, that ye believe
on him whom he has sent. Right there, verse 29, believe
on him, believe on Christ. And religious people always like
to come up and ask you, What are you doing for the Lord? What
works are you involved in? What work are you doing for the
Lord? And a simple reply is, I'm looking to Him who's done
all the work for me. I don't have any work to do that
I can bring to Him or bring before God or make more pleasing or
make me more acceptable. But by looking to Christ, I am
accepted because I trust him and what he did alone. He's my atonement. He's my righteousness. He's my wife. He's my everything. And don't ask me what work I'm
doing. I'm trusting him and I'm looking
at him and I love him. And we see that. Let's look at
when we'll turn here. Let's look. Let's turn to Hebrews
chapter 12. Hebrews. Twelve. Verse two, we just looked at
first. Now, let's read the whole verse.
Hebrews 12, verse two. Looking unto Jesus, the author
and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before
him endured the cross. Despising the shame and is set
down at the right hand of the throne of God. Now that verse
starts out with faith, looking unto Jesus. And this looking
is not a physical look like me and you are doing right now.
The word comes from to consider attentively. To discern clearly. It's a look of the mind. It's
a spiritual look of faith. And that's faith, looking unto
Jesus. It actually carries with it the
meaning from the word to stare. Now, I know staring is not looked
upon as a good thing to do in between us, but it's OK to stare
at Christ, you know, look to him, always stare, stare on him. And and we stare at things that
are beautiful. You know, we like to sit outside,
or at least I do, and watch clouds go by and just stare. And just
look at how beautiful the clouds and the sky and everything can
be. And there's people with natural
beauty. And you'll catch us guys maybe
staring a little longer than we should. So, you know, that's
not the best staring to do, but Christ is beautiful to a believer. And I want to just keep my eyes
fixed on him. and stare at him and upon him. And it should be very easy for
us to look upon and behold how beautiful he is. He's God. He's almighty, holy, righteous,
just, loving, merciful. He's beautiful in that and he's
beautiful in what he did. He was born, lived, died and
rose again for his people. And he gave all. He took every
sinner that he came here to die for. He took this sinner that
was headed straight for hell and made him a saint headed straight
for heaven. And he just made it. He did it. I had nothing to do with it. We'd still be out here going
in circles if he hadn't come down and put us under Todd and
taught us the gospel of his son. And that's just amazing that
he would do that for us, and that is pure and free grace.
To take us and to put us under the sound of the gospel and to
give us hearing ears and a heart that would and could trust Christ
is a miracle. And it's a beautiful miracle.
And when you see how beautiful he is, you'll love him. But this love, some people get
hung up on feelings and emotions of natural love that we have.
And I'm an emotional guy. Very emotional. So, too much. I really don't like it, but it
happens. And so, sometimes you have these
feelings and you think, well, I need to work those up again
so I can feel as close to God as I did when I was having all
these feelings of love and whatever. You know, you can't. Don't get
there looking for love or looking for something inside you to prove
your relationship with God or that you trust Christ. There's
lots of love. There's people that love a lot
and there's people that love a little, that love Christ, because the
woman that poured the ointment on him and washed his feet with
her hair, the Lord said she loved much because she was forgiven
much. And some love little because they're forgiven little. But
guess what? You still love and you're still
forgiven in Christ. So don't get hung up on trying
to work up emotions and work up these feelings of love. I
tell you what, let's look at John chapter 14. I'll show you
how you can love Christ. John 14, look at two verses. John 14, verse 15. If you love me, keep my commandments. Let's look at verse 21. Verse 21. He that hath my commandments
and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me. And he that loveth
me shall be loved to my father, and I will love him and will
manifest myself to him. Keep his commandments. And you
love him. What's his commandment? 1 John
3, 23. Believe on the name of my son. and love each other. His commandment
is to believe Christ. OK, if you believe Christ, if
you trust Christ, you love God. It says it right here in Scriptures.
If you love me, keep my commandments and he that hath my commandments
and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me. Well, his commandment
is to believe on Christ. So he that believeth on me, he
it is that loveth me. And so to trust Christ is to
love Christ. Don't be looking for all his
natural. Well, I have to say we do stuff
and just trust Christ, you keep looking to him and he'll cause
this fruit to continue to grow on you. You don't try and grow
it yourself. You don't sit there and work stuff up. He planted
it and he will give the increase. That's the fruit of the spirit
of love that he's put in you. And we're to live by faith, by
this looking on the cross. That's how we're to live, beholding
the lamb. Our one motive for everything
we do, no matter how big, no matter how small, is love to
Christ who gave all for us. When you can sit there in your
mind's eye and look at what Christ has done for you, who you are
and what you really deserve, and then what He's actually done
for you, you will love Him. And you want to do everything
to please Him. You're not going to need this list of commandments
and this, do this, don't do this, da, da, da, da, da. When you
love somebody, you want to please Him. And that's your joy. And
so when you see Him, you'll want to, you'll love Him and you'll
want to serve Him the best you can. Because He took away your
sins. And that's a gift of grace. And
my favorite hymn is, It is well with your soul. And that one
verse, I think it's the third verse in the song, kind of puts
it in perspective. My sin, all the bliss of this
glorious thought, my sin, not in part, but the whole, is nailed
to the cross and I bear it no more. Praise the Lord, praise
the Lord all my soul. Let's just bear it no more. It's been took away. He nailed
it to the cross and I just Can't say, except I love him. I just
love him for what he did for me. And it's a blessing. I want to conclude by looking
in Isaiah 53. We'll look at a couple of verses
in that familiar book. It speaks of Christ the Lamb. It's a description of the sin-bearing,
sacrificial Lamb of God. We're not going to read the whole
thing. I'm going to read verses 5, 6, and 7. But he was wounded for our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquities.
The chastisement of our peace was upon him, and with his stripes
we are healed. 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. He was oppressed and
he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth He is brought as
a lamb to the slaughter and as a sheep before her shearers is
done, so he opens not his mouth. That's a beautiful, beautiful
picture of Christ, the Lamb of God, and what he did for his
people, and when you see something As beautiful as that, especially
in scriptures, what are you supposed to do with it? Are you supposed
to go make movies of his great suffering or paint pictures of
him and post them everywhere or make statues gold encrusted
or wear little crosses around your neck or a WWJD bracelet?
Is that something that beautiful? You know the answer is no. Well,
what do scriptures say to do? Let's turn back a couple pages
to Isaiah 45. Here's what we're to do with
Christ. Isaiah 45, 22. Look unto me and be you saved
all the ends of the earth. For I am God and there is none
else. So here's here's what we're to
do. And this is what he said in John chapter one. Look unto
me, behold the Lamb of God. And be you saved. And your sins
have been taken away. Behold the Lamb of God which
takes away the sins of the world. And anyone who beholds this Lamb,
who trusts Him in faith, your sins are taken away and before
long you'll be singing in glory, worthy is the Lamb that was slain. Amen.