Back over in Luke's Gospel 24,
and I just wanted to read verse 25 and verse 26 to you again
and make a few comments on them. Old fools and slow of heart to
believe all that the prophets have spoken. Was it not necessary,
ought not Christ to have suffered these things and to enter unto
His glory? Of course, the things that he
was speaking about mainly over in verse 20, how that the chief
priest and our rulers delivered Him to be condemned to death
and have crucified Him. His sufferings. Ought not Christ
to have suffered these things? The things that Christ suffered,
brothers and sisters, you and I cannot begin to enter into
the depths of them. Every aspect of His being, He
suffered in it. He suffered in His name He took
a humble name anyway, didn't He? When He came to this world.
A name that the Father gave Him, Jesus. So many had that name. A common name, really. But none
wore it as He did. And none lived up to it as He
did because it means Savior. But the Bible teaches us that
He suffered in His name and in His character. They called Him
a blasphemer. They called Him a liar. They
called Him a perverter one of a sedacious person, said he had
dealings with familiar spirits, that he was a Beelzebub, that
he cast out devils by the prince of the devils, how he suffered
in his character and his name. He suffered in his body, untold
pains in his body. The Bible says his vestige, his
face was marred more than any man, And His body has farmed
more than the sons of man. We don't understand. We can't
enter in because we've never witnessed how He must have suffered. His beard was plucked from His
face. The bones on His back underneath His skin and muscle appeared
because they whipped Him with a cat of nine tails. He was so
weak that He could hardly bear the cross. And upon Calvary they
pierced His hands and His feet. And while hanging there, they
mocked Him and radicaled Him in His weakness and in His death. But He says you ought not Christ
to have suffered these things. Yes, He should, because it was
prophesied of Him that He should suffer this. The Father had predestinated
Him to suffer this. And not only what I've said now,
but think of the real agony of His soul, because He was bearing
the sin of man in his own body. And bearing the man's sin, he
bore the consequences of it. Not only the guilt that he must
have felt upon his white conscience, his pure conscience, but the
wrath of God that he bore in his body and in his soul. Never
man suffered like he suffered, and yet he had to suffer these.
Ought not Christ to have suffered these things? It was necessary,
wasn't it? It was necessary because it had
been predicted all through the Old Testament that he should
suffer. He predicted it himself when he began to preach that
he must be delivered into the hands of the Gentiles and be
betrayed, even of his own disciple, and denied by another disciple,
and for a time forsaken by all his disciples. Ought not Christ
to have suffered these things? It was necessary. It was binding. It was even a must. And then
he goes on in the second portion of verse 26, and he speaks of
something else. And this is another must. Ought
not Christ to have suffered these things, and to enter unto His
glory? Jesus Christ entered unto His
glory. And what does this tell us? Well,
He never suffered in vain. He suffered for a reason. There
was a cause. behind His suffering. Sometimes
when you and I suffer, we have no idea what the cause is. What
will come out of our suffering, if anything. But when He suffered,
He knew there was a cause. And the cause was this. Out of
His suffering, He was to be exalted. It was through the gates of death
that He was to enter into His glory as a mediator between God
and man. His glory was His resurrection. in a glorified body and ascended
unto heaven and sat in upon the right hand of God. We're told
here in verse 51 in the closing of this book of Luke that he
was carried up into heaven. And Mark says that he was received
up into heaven and sat on the right hand of God. And Peter
says He's gone into heaven and He's on the right hand of God
and angels and powers and authority being made subject unto Him. That's His glory in a nutshell,
that the Father raised Him from the dead and as the mediator
He exalted Him into heaven, set Him on His own right hand to
accomplish His eternal purpose. Everything wasn't done at the
cross, was it? There was something else to be
done, and that's what the Lord Jesus Christ is doing in heaven
now. He has gone unto heaven. Christ and His deity, joined
with His humanity, is exalted to heaven. And He's worshiped
there. Angels worship Him. The saints
that's in heaven worship Him. And you and I, this afternoon,
worship Him in spirit and in truth and through faith. So Christ
is so glorious in His humanity, He's so glorious in His body
and in His power, in His authority, that someday when He shows His
face to this universe, it will flee away. Heaven and earth will
flee from the face of Him that sits upon the throne. He has
gone unto heaven, the Apostle Peter said. William Jay had some
very interesting thing to say on this. He says the Lord Jesus
in his humanity was not the first to enter heaven. Abel was the
first to enter that place. And he said, is it not encouraging
to us to think that the first victim of death was a partaker
of glory? That human nature was found in
heaven before it was seen in hell? Is that not mercy? That
is mercy. What did the angels think when
they looked upon Abel? What did Abel think when he looked
upon the angels? Abel was the first one who went
into heaven. And by the time the Lord Jesus was received into
that place in our humanity, there was a multitude there already. And we believe that He took a
multitude with Him because the Bible says that after His resurrection,
a multitude of the saints arose. And the Bible says that when
he went back up there to that place and stood before those
gates, he said, Be ye lifted up, ye everlasting doors, and
the Lord of hosts shall come in. He took a host back to heaven
with him when he entered that place after his resurrection.
But none had gone to heaven as the Lord Jesus did. No man ever
entered heaven as Christ did in our humanity. Enoch entered
there in his humanity. Elijah entered that place in
his humanity, in their bodies, but they were changed. But Jesus
Christ entered there from His death. He went to heaven from
His tomb. Elijah or Enoch, neither one
did that. And everyone else goes to heaven,
and they enter there by the merit and mercy of another. But Jesus
entered there by His own merit. They entered there because the
Lord made them worthy. But Jesus entered there Himself
because in and of Himself, Wayne, He was worthy. Nobody else ever
worked His way into heaven but Jesus Christ. He entered there
because He worked His way to heaven. Others entered there
as private persons. They entered there for themselves
only. Peter entered there for himself
only. And John the Apostle, they were great men. But they didn't
enter there for anybody else. A husband has never entered there
on the behalf of his wife or the wife of the children. Everybody
that goes to heaven enters there as a private person. But when
Jesus Christ entered heaven, He entered there on behalf of
others. He entered there as a public
person. He's gone to heaven, and He's
entered that place, and because He has, He assures the entrance
of a great host of other people, even a number that no man can
number. Listen to Hebrews chapter 6 verse 19. It says, We have
a hope that is sure and steadfast, which entereth unto that within
the veil, whether the forerunner is for us entered. He's a forerunner. That means
other people are coming after Him. Because He's entered there,
He assures that all His people one day will enter there. Mary's
there. But I doubt if she prays for
anybody. And Peter and all those apostles there. What good would
that do you and what good would that do me? But our hope of going
there is that our Savior's there. And He's a forerunner for us.
Because I live, ye shall live. also. When Joseph was exalted
out of prison to Pharaoh's palace, it wasn't just for his own advancement,
but he was exalted to be a salvation to his father's house. And when
the Lord Jesus left the grave and entered heaven, it was for
the salvation of his father's people, of his father's house. On the cross, the Lord Jesus
cried, ìIt's finished.î And what was finished? I tell you, the elect wasn't
called yet. The elect weren't justified yet.
They weren't glorified yet, so that wasn't finished. What was
finished? Eternal redemption was acquired. It was obtained. He took possession
of it. But it wasn't applied. Jesus
on the cross acquired our redemption. He obtained it. But it's Jesus
on the throne that applies. or redemption. So He has two
works, doesn't He? He has a glory that He's already
obtained. There's glory in the cross because
there's where He reconciled us to God by His death. But there's
another glory that since we're reconciled to God by His death,
we are saved by His life. On the cross, Christ acquired. On the throne, He applies. What a blessed thought. And that's
the glory that He has now entered into. And brothers and sisters,
one has already been completed, and one is in the process. But
you know that that's in the process is just as sure as that that
has already been completed. He shall not fail and be discouraged. He never failed on the cross.
He'll not fail on the throne, will He? His glory. That is His glory. He had two
victories to obtain, one on earth and one in the heaven. When we
were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son. Much more being reconciled, we
shall be saved by His life. You and I have read the end of
the book, haven't we? Isn't it wonderful to have a book and
we know the ending of it? We know the history of redemption. It's already been told us in
the last chapter of the book of Revelations. From Genesis
to Revelations, we know the history of redemption. And it's infallibly
told. I know there's warnings. There's
warnings to God's people. There's instructions. And sometimes
we have crosses, and sometimes we have losses, and sometimes
we have gains. Here in this life, we struggle.
We have to, through much tribulation, enter into the Kingdom of Heaven.
I know all of that. And you and I work our way through
all of those things, don't we? But still, the history's been
told. Christ is on His throne. And
He's finished the work of redemption, and now He's applying it to our
hearts. And it is as good as done. And
when all is said and done, He says Himself, all the Father
has given to Me, I will lose nothing, but raise it up again
at the last day. Now that is His glory. Ought
not the Son to have suffered these things and entered unto
His glory? And there are two events to prove
Christ's glory was assured Him. The one was the resurrection.
What did the resurrection prove? The resurrection proved He accomplished
on the cross what He set out to accomplish. His resurrection
proved that He was indeed the Son of God. Brother Wayne taught
us a lesson on Romans chapter 1 that one of the proofs that
Jesus Christ was the Son of God, He raised Himself from the dead. No man ever did that. But He
said, I lay down my life I have power to do that. I have power
to take it up again. And when He raised from the dead,
that showed us who He was. He was indeed the Son of God
with all power. And the second proof of His glory
that was to be bestowed upon Him is in Acts chapter 2 that
you remember very well. The coming of the blessed Holy
Spirit. He said, Nevertheless, I tell
you the truth, it is expedient for you that I go away. For if
I go not away, the Comforter will not come. But if I depart,
I will send Him unto you. And when He is come, what will
He do? He will glorify Me. For He will
take of Mine, and He will show it unto you. So we know that
He has entered into His glory for those two reasons. Resurrection
and the power of the Holy Spirit. Our Lord had a work to do on
the cross, and this He did physically. And it was a glorious work, and
there is a work He must do now, and it is just as glorious. But
that work can only be accomplished by the Holy Ghost, the third
person of the Sacred Trinity, which is called Christ Himself. Christ in you. How does Christ
get in us? He can not physically, can He?
But He can by His Spirit, by the third person of the Sacred
Trinity. Not by power, not by might, but
by My Spirit, saith the Lord. Some people, and I don't know
how all of you feel about this, but some people are looking for
a physical kingdom. that Christ is going to come
back and set up a kingdom over Jerusalem and we'd have to go
over there to see Him and worship Him? That would be inferior to
the kingdom that He's set up now, wouldn't it? And I say this
with all reverence, but Christ in His humanity is limited, isn't
He? He's limited to one place at
a time. It's expedient for you that I
go away. It's profitable for you. If I
go away, I'll come back again in my Spirit, in the third person
of the blessed Trinity. I'll be without limitations.
I can do then what I cannot do now. I can be everywhere at one
time. I can be in you. I can be with
your Spirit. And that's His glory. You remember
when He sent His apostles out before Him in those 70 that He
called? He sent them out before His face,
two by two? Why did He do that? He was limited. He could not physically be in
every place. He was truly in our humanity,
wasn't He? And when He took Himself to Himself,
our humanity, He limited Himself. But He's not limited in His Holy
Spirit. Therefore, when He came back
on the day of Pentecost, that was His glory. And now every
man that stands to preach the gospel can preach the gospel
with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven. He can be everywhere. What an advantage then that is
for us. But that's His glory. That's
His glory. He sent the Holy Spirit back
to this earth. For 2,000 years now the gospel
has spread. Nations have raised and nations
fall, but the gospel just keeps spreading, doesn't it? The elect of God are being called
in. The gates of hell have not prevailed
against her. And it's going to continue this
way until the end of time, and the church will be glorified,
raised from the dust, and made just like the Lord Jesus Christ.
All of this is being accomplished because Christ is on His throne. Christ has entered heaven and
sent His Spirit back to do that. And the Scripture says then,
we shall forever be with the Lord. Christ has indeed suffered,
but He's entered unto His glory. Dear old Spurgeon used to say,
I've said this so many times, but it's so true, He said, if
you're suffering and things are going bad with
you, if you've got a good friend that it's well with, He said,
that gives you relief. That makes you happy. And it
may not always be well with us. We may come into some rough places,
some humps and bumps, but you know with our friend in heaven,
it's well with him. He's entered unto His glory.
He's not suffering now physically. Oh, He suffers in His people.
We know that. But He's happy, isn't He? He's
entered unto His glory. Don't that help you in your sufferings?
In your grief? It's well with Him. And I tell
you, if it's well with Him, it's well with me. If it's well with
Him, it's well with you. Christ is on His throne. Randy, would you please