Isaiah chapter 28. I'm glad we
have something that's sure, something that's steadfast, something that's
unmovable, and it's the Lord Jesus Christ and His finished
work. On Sunday, I'm studying right
now to bring a message from the book of Joel, two messages actually,
and Zion is mentioned. And so we're going to be looking
at Zion. I was actually going to preach on that tonight, but
realized that there's something that's mentioned when Zion's
always mentioned, there's the foundation. And so that's why
I want to preach tonight on the sure foundation. In order for
anything to be built, it had to have a good foundation. When
we were looking at this building, the first question I asked is
how's the foundation? How does it look? And everyone
that I spoke to, Joe and Rob and other men, the foundation
looks great. It's been here since the 1820s
or whatever. It's like, well, it's probably
got a good foundation then if it's lasted that long. But think
about the foundation of the Lord. It's been forever. It's an everlasting
foundation that had no beginning nor no end. This is the hope
that we have, the sure foundation of the Lord's finished work.
Now here in Isaiah 28, he speaks of this foundation. And let's
look in verse 16. Therefore thus saith the Lord
God. Behold, I lay in Zion For a foundation,
a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner stone, a sure foundation. He that believeth shall not make
haste. Judgment also will I lay to the
line, and righteousness to the plummet. And the hail shall sweep
away the refuge of lies, and the waters shall overflow the
hiding place. And your covenant with death
shall be disannulled, and your agreement with hell shall not
stand. When the overflowing scourge shall pass through, then you
shall be trodden down by it." We must have a sure foundation
or verse 18 will be our demise. It'll be our end. We must have
a sure foundation. Now it doesn't matter how pretty
the building is. When we were looking for a building,
we weren't necessarily concerned with how pretty the building
was because we can dress up a building, can't we? We're doing it now.
When I first saw the paneling, I knew, okay, we got to paint
that for sure. Saw the carpet, okay, we got to get rid of that
carpet. It doesn't matter how pretty the building is, what
matters is the foundation. If the foundation is good, then
the building will stand. You can change the rest of it
if you so choose. But I'm so thankful that in the
Lord's gospel, he is the foundation, and he has made his church beautiful
based upon his foundation, and he's done this by a cornerstone.
Now, a cornerstone, whenever they would build corner, when
I would build buildings back in Bible times, they didn't have
levels like we have today. They didn't have lasers like
we have today. They didn't have equipment like
we had today. They didn't start out by digging down and then
pouring concrete. They didn't have concrete like
we do today. What they had was a cornerstone, and they would
start with that cornerstone. It would be the main focal point
for the entire building. They would draw their level lines
from it and their plumb lines. Now, level means that it's perfect
left to right this way, and plumb means vertical. Yes, vertical,
it's good. So you have a plumb and you have
a level. What they would do is they would begin to build this
building based solely upon that cornerstone. Everything would
be built to it. Everything would conform to it.
Everything would lean upon it, and the building would be erected
from it. Christ is that chief cornerstone for his people. That's
what his church has been built upon is everything that he has
done. He's the one that fashioned it. He's the one that framed
it. He's the one that put it together. He's the one that performed it.
He's the one that designed it by great designs of grace. And
this is our hope that we have that sure foundation. We have
the Lord Jesus Christ. Now all false religion is built
on pretty buildings, but there's no sure foundation in false religion. There's only one gospel, and
it's a gospel that gives us a sure foundation because it's His work
alone. Christ gave the parable one time
of the foolish man and the wise man. And I remember being a child,
we used to sing the song, a foolish man built his house upon the
sand, the foolish man built his house upon the sand, the rains
came tumbling down. But this is the parable that the Lord
gave to his disciples. He was speaking to the multitude.
He said, the foolish man built his house upon the sand and the
rain came down. And when the waters came down, the floods
came up, the house on the sand was destroyed, wasn't it? Why?
Because sand is shifting. Sand is moving. And being at
the ocean, if you've ever been at the ocean, you stand at the
edge of the water and that water will hit your feet. That sand
underneath you will move, won't it? And that's exactly what all
false religion is. They believe they have hope in
their foundation, but that's no hope. It's built upon sand. And we see the picture of the
Lord's gospel where the wise man builds his house upon the
rock. Christ Jesus is that rock. It's the rock that's forever
settled in heaven. It's the foundation that the
Lord's built his gospel upon, the good news for his people.
It's the salvation that he hath wrought. That's the rock. We
don't look to ourself in any way, shape, or form for our salvation,
do we? We look to the Lord Jesus Christ
and his sure foundation. Yeah, there's good news knowing
that we cannot lay anything to it. We cannot do anything in
this salvation. The Lord said, I lay, behold,
I lay in Zion a chief cornerstone. Now, Peter mentions this in first
Peter chapter two, and he says, I lay in Zion a chief cornerstone
elect, precious, and he that believeth on him shall not be
confounded." So we have a sure foundation in the Lord Jesus
Christ because we have a chief cornerstone who was elect, tried,
precious, and sure. And we're going to look at all
four of those tonight, Lord willing. The chief cornerstone is the
rock where everything has been built to, aligned to, measured
to, conformed to. And aren't you thankful that
the Lord conforms us to His image? Not progressive sanctification.
That's not what I'm talking about. Whenever the Lord Jesus Christ
died, was buried, and was risen again, every person that He brought
with Him have already been conformed to His image. They've already
been glorified. Now, me and you, as I mentioned Sunday, we have
this seed of His within us that we can't see yet that's brought
forth this glory that I'm mentioning. But one day when we see Him,
we shall be made like Him for we shall see Him as He is. We'll
see that we've always been there, that there's never been time
that we haven't been there. We've always been there with
Him forever. This is our sure foundation.
Now, In this cornerstone that I'm mentioning, you can imagine
they had to chisel away pieces of the rock to make the other
rocks conformable to it, for that line to be good or for that
plumb line to be good. And isn't that what the Lord
does to his people? Not in salvation, it's already
finished, but does he not, as that song said, the fire will
not overthrow thee, only designed to get rid of the draws. That's what he does, doesn't
he? He draws out that confession over and over from us. It says,
truth, Lord, you're right, and I'm wrong. That's the chipping
away of this old flesh, isn't it? That's exactly what it is.
That's conforming us to His way. That's making us look unto Him
through faith. That's how He does it for His
people throughout our life. Everything is manipulated. everything
is until it is conformed to that chief cornerstone. Everything
is based off of that chief cornerstone. It's made to look like it. Everything
has to look good down both ways. That's what the Lord's done for
his people in this finished work. He's already done that, hasn't
he? He's conformed us to the image of his son. Now, you and
I can't see that. We're just a bunch of old ugly
rocks, but not in his eyes. No, not in his eyes. We've been
conformed to the chief cornerstone. That's why we have a sure foundation
to stand upon. I was reminded of the carpet
that we had, and I meant to mention this sooner, and I was so thankful
for the picture. We come in here to worship, and
I'm I walked in and I would see the paint splatters and I thought,
you know, that's me compared to the rest of these pews. I
feel like I'm the one that's got the paint splatter all over
me. I feel like I'm the one that's ugly and I need to be cleaned.
Well, I watched three or four of you ladies try your best to
clean off those pews and it was not going to happen. It couldn't
because it was stained up really bad, wasn't it? And this, this
is exactly what men do by nature. We try to, We tried to go in
and fix the problem, the stain that we have on the inside, and
it can't happen. You can't fix it. We couldn't
fix it. So what do we do? Well, we needed the covering
for it, didn't we? And that's exactly what happened. We covered
it up and we put it in the back, which is exactly what the Lord
does to his people. He says, no, you're going to
be a base. You're not going to be exalted. I didn't come that
you may look at yourself and think about how good you look.
I came to show you my goodness in covering you up. This is what
the chief cornerstone is to us. This is what we rest in is that
he is exalted and we are a base. The other carpet couldn't be
Couldn't be saved either, could it? We had to rip it up, didn't
we? And what was found underneath it whenever it was completely
taken away? We have this pretty hardwood floor now, don't we?
That's a picture of what the Lord's done for us. He's taken
away this ugliness, if you want to put it that way, that we are.
And that's a poor analogy, I know, but I'm just saying a whole time,
guess what was there? Well, that's the seed that was
in there the whole time, wasn't it? That's what the Lord's done.
in this sure foundation that we stand upon. It's nothing that
we've done. We were all stained up. We were
all dirty, disgusting. And yet the Lord has made us
perfectly righteous by his own blood. This is the sure foundation
that we rest all of our hope in. Men think that in the court of
law, that they'll be able to go with this stained up Well, think about it this way,
in literal court of law, speaking to somebody about this on Sunday,
and I said, if a judge says guilty to somebody, and they've been
proven guilty by all the evidence, and it's insurmountable evidence,
there's no doubt this person's guilty. They're caught on video,
they're caught, the recording catches them speaking in the
act, everything, there's no doubt that they're guilty, whatever
it may be. Men believe that they're gonna be able to stand before
God and say, well, I know I've done that wrong, but I've done
this right. I've done this right, and I've
done this right, and I've done this right. It's not going to do any good,
is it? It's not going to get rid of the problem. It's not
going to fix the foundation. The foundation must be in Christ's
righteousness alone. Now, our hope is this. When we
stand before the Lord, He doesn't look at us and pull up our record
and say, okay, I find you guilty. What are you going to offer in
the stead of that? Our hope is that Christ was found
guilty in our stead so that we might be made the righteousness
of God in him. There's a sure foundation that
we can stand on. It's the only foundation that
whenever Christ Jesus died, he died in our stead for his people,
redeeming them back to God. So now the slate is clear. The record rings justified. The Lord doesn't see the sin
of his people any longer. They've been completely put away.
This is what I'm preaching on tonight in the sure foundation.
We have surety. We have a surety and a sure foundation
in the Lord Jesus Christ and his finished work. Well, the first thing we see
here in Isaiah 28, verse 16, as it says, therefore, thus saith
the Lord God, behold, I lay. Now that's what the gospel starts
with, isn't it? That's where the sure foundation
starts is God said, I will. God said, I lay. It's the Lord that had to enact
upon us because you and I could not do anything for ourself.
I like the word behold. It's an interesting word, which
literally means examine or look at, take note of. But only the
Lord's people can behold this stone that he has laid in Zion.
Only the Lord's people have been given eyes to see and ears to
hear. It would be like telling a deaf
person, listen to what I'm telling you. Well, a deaf man can't hear
what you're saying, or a deaf woman can't hear what you're
saying. A blind man, you say, look how beautiful the rainbow
is. A blind man can't see it. But when the Lord says, behold,
he never says it in vain. Whenever he says, behold, do
you know what our response is to that? We see it. We behold
it, don't we? Our eyes are opened. We see him. We see the chief cornerstone.
We see the sure foundation. We see his finished work. And
we see that it's all by his grace that he said, I lay in Zion a
stone. It was according to his own pleasure.
was according to his own purpose before the foundation of the
world. It was his choice. It's his work. Everything about
salvation is him doing it. And that's our sure foundation,
isn't it? That's what we rest in. He says, I lay, he's the
doer of it. And you know what that means?
He gets all the glory for it. And the Lord's people love that
because we see ourself as not being, not having a sure foundation
outside of him. That's the truth of the gospel,
is we see ourself as unable to stand. We're on sinking sand
all around us, but here is our sure foundation. The Lord said,
I lay in Zion for my people. I lay a sure foundation for them.
And we rejoice, don't we? We say, truth, Lord, I don't
have a foundation. Give me Christ. Give me Christ,
the sure foundation, lest I die. This is where the foundation
begins. I love the thought of the I am, the sovereign I am
said, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy. Now, some
men read that and they become angry because it says on whom
he will have mercy, but the believer rejoices just in the fact that
he says, I will have mercy. You have mercy, Lord. Is there
mercy for me? He says, I will have mercy. That's a promise, isn't it? That's
hope. That's a sure foundation. Lord,
have mercy upon me, the sinner. That's what we cry out when we
hear that. He gets all the glory for that as well, doesn't he?
Because he's given us faith. He's given us his faith to look
to him. Now you'll notice that he says in verse 16, I lay in
Zion for a foundation, a stone, a tri stone, a precious cornerstone. Now, I believe I had a, I have his turning
there in a minute, but what I'm, so I kind of messed up my notes
a little bit here, but that's okay. What, what he's saying
here. is the chief stone, the chief
cornerstone. Do you remember me reading that
to you a little bit, or quoting that to you a bit ago? So this
chief cornerstone, by definition, chief is the highest. Chief is
the one with the most authority. And that's who the Lord is. So
this is who's speaking. When I said the I am, said I
will, it's the chief of all cornerstones. It's the one that can do whatsoever
he will, with whomsoever he will. He's higher than the heavens.
He's exalted above all. He's the alpha and omega, the
beginning and the end, the first and the last. He's the one which
was, which is, which is to come. This is who I'm speaking of,
the Lord Jesus Christ himself, the chief cornerstone. That's
our resting place. I would remind us that upon the
face of the earth, the winds and waves obeyed his voice and
they have not forgotten who created them. This is our resting place,
is in the sovereignty of our God. This is our sure foundation,
his finished work for his people. All things were made by him,
and without him there was not anything made that was made.
The Lord's people like it that way, don't we? Even in salvation,
by great designs of grace, by his determinate counsel and foreknowledge,
God purposed to redeem his people from themselves, from their sin. Now what we see here in verse
16, I just read it to us, I won't read it again, we see four things.
We see four different descriptions of this stone, this particular
stone, and I want to look at those briefly. The first thing
we see is, I lay in Zion for a foundation, a stone, a tried
stone. Now, Christ Jesus was tried of
men on multiple accounts. He was tried by Pilate, who said,
I find no fault in this man. And yet the Jews said, crucify
him. Let his blood be upon us and on our children. We see that
he was tried by the Pharisees, the very ones that were supposed
to be leading men to God. That's what the Pharisees' responsibility,
by definition, they were the ones, the high priests and such
that were the ministers of the Lord. They were the ones saying
that we are speaking on God's behalf. And this is what men
are in false religion. They were not speaking on God's
behalf, were they? They were speaking on their own
behalf for power, for popularity, or even pleasure. I mean, this
is what these men did. So when the Lord came, and he
challenged their position, they wanted to kill him, didn't they?
They wanted to kill him and they tried to kill him. How many times
do we read in the scripture, and they would have taken him,
but he passed through them and they couldn't see him, or they
was going to push him over a cliff. They were going to try to push
him over a cliff to kill him, but he passed through them unnoticed.
Why? Because he's sovereign. Because
it wasn't his purpose to come here to be tried of men. It was
his purpose to come here to be tried of his father. to be tried
by fire. for his people, that's how he's
a tried stone, is he endured the wrath on the cross of Calvary
for his people. When the fire of God's wrath
fell, the Lord Jesus Christ took every bit of it into himself,
putting away our sin in the process. This is why he's a tried stone.
Sure, he was tried of men, he was mocked, he was beat, all
these things, but when the Lord made his soul an offering for
sin, that's the tried stone that I'm speaking on, the one that
endured the wrath of God for the salvation of his people. Lord knew that he was going to
be rejected upon arriving. In Matthew 21, he tells us, did
you never read in the scriptures, the stone which the builders
rejected, the same has become the head of the corner? This
is the Lord's doing and it's marvelous in your eyes. It's
marvelous in our eyes. The only way that it's marvelous,
this chief cornerstone, we're reminded in the scripture that
even in Isaiah 53, it said that he was rejected of men, he was
despised. The only way that you and I are
going to marvel and think that this cornerstone is beautiful
is through the eyes of faith. It has nothing to offer this
flesh whatsoever. The flesh is enmity against God
and hates God in every way because God is other than we are, and
we can't please him. But through the eyes of faith,
we see this cornerstone, this sure foundation, and we rest. We rest in him and what he accomplished. Lord Jesus Christ being the tried
stone. Now, remember whenever I just
mentioned to us about the plumb line and the level line. Well,
this is the righteous judgment of God. We have to be perfectly
righteous. If anything's out of line, it
gets tapped back into place. It gets moved and adjusted. It
gets manipulated to this cornerstone. So what am I saying? I'm saying
that on the cross of Calvary, the Lord had a righteous judgment
for his son. It's the same plumb line and
level line that everyone's gonna have to face the Lord with one
day. The good news of the gospel is, is that the Lord Jesus Christ
stood in our stead, didn't he? He stood in our stead, enduring
the wrath of God. He extinguished it for his people
because justice was satisfied. Now, whenever the line comes
to us, plumb line, we measure up. Whenever the level line comes
to us, we measure up. Why? Because we have our own
righteousness? No, because we are found having
the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ. When he sees us,
he sees his precious son, the chief cornerstone, and he is
satisfied. He's satisfied with his son.
He did all this to be the sure foundation for his people. And
the second thing he talks about is a precious stone. Precious
by definition means prized, honorable, or of the highest value because
of its rarity. Lord Jesus Christ was one of
a kind, wasn't he? He's the only cornerstone that ever pleased
the father. He's the one that we must be
made like him. We must be made like him. Hold
your place and turn with me to first Peter chapter two. 1 Peter 2, verse 4. To whom coming as unto a lively
stone, disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God and precious.
Ye also, as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house and
holy priesthood to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God
by Jesus Christ. Wherefore also it is contained
in the scriptures, behold, I lay in Zion, a chief cornerstone.
That's what I mentioned to us while ago, a chief cornerstone,
elect, precious, and he that believeth on him shall not be
confounded. Unto you, therefore, which believe
he is precious, but unto them which be disobedient. the stone
the builders disallowed, the same as made the head of the
corner, and a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offence, even to
them which stumble at the word being disobedient, whereinto
also they were appointed. But ye are a chosen generation,
a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people, that ye should
show forth the praises of him who had called you out of darkness
into his marvellous light, which in time past were not a people,
but now are the people of God, which have not obtained mercy,
but now have obtained mercy." The only way where he tells us
to whom coming. The only way that we come to
Christ is that the Lord Jesus Christ has come. Peter could
not have walked on the water unless the Lord said, come. He
had to be bid first, didn't he? Now this coming is not a one-time
thing. People say, I got saved. That's
not proper, not proper lingo according to the scripture. We're
being saved constantly, aren't we? We were saved in eternity
past, if I can use that as a term, and we're being saved now and
we're going to be saved forever. And that's how the Lord does
things, is it's everlasting. But to whom coming? It's a continual. It's a continual coming unto
him, isn't it? It's a continual drawing. It's not one act, but
constantly coming to Christ. Paul said this in Hebrews chapter
12, looking unto Jesus. Looking. Well, when do I look?
Right now. And right now. And right now it's constantly
looking. Lord calls me to look. I'll turn my eyes away from you.
I see that you're a precious stone that I need, that I must
have for eternal life. But I get so distracted by all
these other things. Lord calls me to look again.
And he says, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our
faith. The author and finisher of faith, who for the joy that
was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame and
is sat down on the right hand of God. So the question I have
for us is if we know that it's, It's Him that we're coming to.
It's Him that we're looking to. Why do we keep coming? Why do
we keep looking or trying to look? We try, don't we? I mean, but why do we keep returning
to Him? He tells us here in this chapter
that we just read that He's a living stone, a living stone. See, all life comes from Him.
And we see that we're dead and trespasses and in sin. And if
we're gonna have life, and have it more abundantly. It's only
gonna be through and by Him. You remember Sunday, I already
mentioned this, but the seed is within His people. This is
the life-giving water that only He can provide. This is the bread
of life that only He can give. This is what He does for His
people. This living water is the living water that quenched
the wrath of God. It did, He endured. This living
water, the Lord Jesus Christ quenched the wrath. It also quenches
the elect's thirst, doesn't it? It does the exact same thing.
The bread of life satisfies the hungry soul, the Lord's people. It's the only thing. That's why
we keep coming, isn't it? This is the only thing that satisfies
me. This is the only thing that's
a sure foundation. I've got to have Him. Lord, bring
me back again. Give me this bread again. Give
me this bread again. Lord, give me your blood again.
Lord, wash me with your water again. Lord, save me. Lord, save
me. Lord, call me. This is why he is so precious,
because he's the only one that is the fountain of living water.
He's the only one that's the bread of life. He's the only
one that could have been the cornerstone, the precious foundation
stone. He's the only one that qualified
to do so. Everything that would have been
built upon us would have crumbled and fallen. We would have had
nothing steadfast to stand upon, but we have something constant,
something sure, the sure foundation, the Lord Jesus Christ. and His
work. This is why He's fairer than
10,000 to my soul, the scripture says. Now in the scripture, the
number 10,000 is considered like, if I can say it this way, the
biggest number that's given. So 10,000 would be a vast number. It's not just 10,000, it would
be innumerable number. And one of my daughters the other
night was talking to me and I said, how much do you like whatever
she was eating? And she was like, dad, I give
it a gazillion out of a gazillion. And I understood what she meant
by that. It's a big number, isn't it? Well, he's the fairest of
a gazillion to my soul, is what I'm trying to tell us. Whatever
number that is, however many zeros you want to put on it,
whatever you want to compare him to, there is no comparison. He's the only sure foundation. He's the only precious stone. He's the only one. He's the only
lily of the valley. He's the only rose of Sharon
in the Bright and Morning Star. He's the rose among the grass,
isn't he? This is the precious stone. that we stand upon, the
Lord Jesus Christ. Now, we read just a moment ago
that the builders disallowed it. That word disallowed means
rejected or not approved of men. And you and I, by nature, would
have disallowed him as well. But thanks be to God. the father
approved of his son, the father who is rich in mercy, then made
Christ Jesus unto us all our wisdom, all our righteousness,
all our sanctification and all our redemption. This is our hope.
This is the sure foundation that we stand upon. I like how John puts it in 1 John
3, he says, now are we the sons of God, right now. I like the
word now, I've told you all that many times. I find myself saying
youse guys sometimes too now, just so you know. Youse guys
heard me say that many times, haven't you? Right now, we're
the sons of God. Right now, we're His people.
Right now, we're a chosen generation. Right now, we're a royal priesthood.
Right now, we are those that did not obtain mercy, but have
obtained mercy right now in His eyes. Right now, we're accepted
in the beloved. Right now we're chosen of God,
elect of God. Why? Because of our sure foundation
that we're standing upon, because of the finish work of Christ. This is why he's precious to
his people. This is why he's our sure foundation. Turn with
me a few pages back to 1 Corinthians 3. 1 Corinthians 3 and verse 11 tells
us, where other foundations can no
man lay, and that is laid, which is Jesus Christ. See, when the
Lord said it is finished, he is the foundation whereby all
was finished in salvation. We can't lay another foundation,
can we? Did you know the Lord's people
don't want to? We don't want to, we're happy, we're satisfied
with the cornerstone, the Lord Jesus Christ, that foundation.
Now it's certain that we may take our eyes off of him for
a brief moment, but he always brings us back to him and we're
always satisfied and we always know, Lord, there's sometimes
we don't know if we're his. I know that this is true and
we're concerned with that. We think, am I his? I don't know.
Look to Christ during those moments would be the response I would
give you. But what I'm trying to say on top of that is, Whenever
we don't see, when we can't see the cornerstone, realize it's
still there. It still remains. And the confession
that we have, even in those moments, is the only hope that I have
is that sure foundation. This is what Peter, the only
reason Peter's faith did not fail was because Christ prayed
for him. Your confession of the Lord does not change, does it?
He finished the work. You believe that, don't you?
You believe that this is the only sure foundation. This is
your only hope in salvation. So when you begin to doubt whether
you're his or not, cry out for mercy. Lord, have mercy upon
me, the sinner. Cause me to see the firm foundation
because I'm starting to step on sinking sand looking to myself.
That's what we must cry out. And in mercy, you know what he
does? He brings us back to him over and over again. Shows us
that no other foundation can a man lay. other than that which
is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now verse 12 tells us, now, if
any man build up on this foundation, gold, silver, precious stones,
wood, hay, stubble, every man's work shall be manifest for the
day shall declare it because it shall be revealed by fire
and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is. If any man's work abide, which
he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward. Now, men will
use this verse and they'll say, okay, we should be working for
Jesus. Now, what they mean by that is, is we should be soul
winning. We should be trying to get another jewel in our crown. I remember in religion, it was
preached several times that we would receive, you could get
up to seven crowns when you die and go to heaven. Get up to seven
crowns. Depends on whether you get a
soul winner's crown, you get this and you get that. Crown
of righteousness, you've already got that because the Lord did
his part and you did your part. That's what they would say. There's
only one crown. There's only one crown and it
is the crown of righteousness. It's the crown of the Lord, what
the Lord Jesus Christ has done for his people. It's what he
has crowned his people with. And when we get there, we're
not going to be dancing around in a robe and a crown. We're
going to be bowing at his precious feet. We're going to be bowing,
resting in his finished work, resting in the chief cornerstone,
the sure foundation. The Lord's gonna try every work
by fire, and only the precious cornerstone's work will stand. What are we resting in? Are we
resting in ourself? Are we resting in our work? It's
gonna be burnt up with a fervent heat, what he just told us. No,
we're resting on a sure foundation, aren't we? We're resting in Christ
alone as our hope. Foundation that Christ is all. Now, the disciples were with
the Lord one time and the Lord asked the disciples, who do men
say that I am? And they said, well, some say
you're John the Baptist, some say you're Elias or one of the
other prophets. And he stopped them and he said, who do you
say that I am? Now that's the question, isn't
it? Who do you say that Christ is. Peter spoke up and I love
Peter. He gives me, Christ gives me
hope. But if I can look at a man in
the scripture and think, yup, Lord, that's me for sure. I just
don't want to be Judas. That's my fear. But Peter, I
mean, he had the right things to say sometimes and he put his
foot in his mouth other times. I've mentioned that to you before,
but he said, who do you say that I am? Peter said, thou art the
Christ, the son of the living God. And the Lord said, blessed
are thou, Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood hath not revealed
this to you, but my Father, which is in heaven. And I say unto
you, Peter, upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates
of hell shall not prevail against it. Now I wrote an article about
this, so you'll see it again on Sunday. When the Lord said,
upon this rock, he said, blessed art thou, Peter, upon this rock
I'll build my church. I've heard men say, well, you
need to be more like Peter because the Lord will build something
upon what you do. That's not what the Lord's saying.
The Lord said, blessed art thou, Peter, for the confession that
you dismayed, that Christ is the son of the living God, had
to come through and by him alone. And the confession that he is
the only sure foundation that we have is the only thing that
hell cannot touch. That's the only thing. That's
where he built his church upon is the confession of faith in
the Lord Jesus Christ. And we have that in common, don't
we? What's your confession? It's the same as mine. We're
dead dog sinners needing a savior. We need a sure foundation. This
is how he's built his church. He's done it over. He calls you
and I in different ways over and over again, but it's finished. We have a sure foundation that
it's already been built. The church of God has never had
one more member added to it or taken away from it from the beginning
of time. It's a sure foundation, a sure
building. And I'm kind of getting into
Zion a little bit, but it's the same thing. It's the Lord's finished
work, isn't it? It's what he's built with his
own hands. It's his faith, his sovereign
grace for his elect sinners. This is why we keep looking.
This is why we keep coming to. This is why we keep trusting
in Christ. That's the answer to the question.
Why do we keep coming? Because he is the only sure foundation. Now. There's one more. Definition here they give of
this. Cornerstone this foundation if you want to turn back to Isaiah
chapter 28 in closing. Isaiah 28 and verse 16 tells
us, therefore, thus saith the Lord God, behold, I lay in Zion
for a foundation, a stone, a tried stone, a precious cornerstone,
a sure foundation, a sure foundation. And you know, that's what I've
titled this message. But David had this to say in
Psalm 11. I read this, I guess you'd call
it the call to worship. He said, if the foundations be
destroyed, what can the righteous do? See, we have all our eggs
in one basket, don't we? We have not diversified our hope,
have we? We haven't diversified our desire. We have one desire. We have one
hope. We have all our eggs in a basket.
We're putting our complete trust in the Lord Jesus Christ because
of the faith which he's given unto us. We have no other hope
besides this sure foundation. If the foundations be destroyed,
what will the righteous do? Righteous would be lost, wouldn't
they? but it's forever settled in heaven. Man cannot touch it.
Satan cannot touch it. No, nothing, nothing shall separate
us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus. Neither height,
nor depth, nor any other creature. Why? Because it's a sure foundation. It's a steadfast, constant, unmovable
foundation. Now the question is, is all our
hope in His work alone? in his foundation alone, what
he has built? That might sound like an easy
question. Most would say yes immediately, and even in religion.
Is all your hope in Christ? Yes, absolutely. Well, you might
could answer some other questions regarding salvation or how it's
obtained or other things like that. You'd find out pretty quick
that it's not true. See, the lie isn't that we've transgressed
the law, as I've said recently. The lie is that we can do something
to fix it. We can do nothing to fix it. We must be standing
upon this sure foundation alone for all of our hope. We have
one thing we're holding on to. We've made lies our refuge, as
he just said here. We've made a covenant with death
as our hiding place. And you see what he tells us
here. He says, verse 18, your covenant with death shall be
disannulled and your agreement with hell shall not stand. We
know this to be true, don't we? And therefore we have not made
a covenant with death. We look to Christ and his covenant
with his father that he fulfilled as our steady ground, as our
constant ground, as our firm foundation. We look to his disannulling
of our covenant by saying, here's the covenant of grace. It disannulls
your covenant of works. And we say, truth, Lord, I don't
want to work because I'm standing upon sand. I need to be found
upon the rock and only you can do it. Only you could have put
me in Christ before the foundation of the world because I can't
get in Christ now and I can't get out of Christ now. Nothing
I can do. That's good news. The Lord calls me to see that
I'm in Christ, calls me to be standing upon the sure foundation. And we have this promise. David asks, if the foundation
be destroyed, what the righteous do? Well, Timothy, Paul wrote
to Timothy said, nevertheless, the foundation of God standeth
sure. Standeth sure. We have a sure
foundation. Having this seal, the Lord knoweth
them that are his. See, no matter what we've done,
no matter what we're doing, or no matter what we're going to
do, this foundation will stand through time and eternity, and
nothing can change it, nothing can disannul it, nothing can
manipulate it, nothing can add to or take away from it. This
is the sure foundation that the Lord hath purpose. It's no wonder
David said, the name of the Lord is a strong tower. It's a constant
tower. It's a sure foundation. The righteous run into it and
are saved. What do we save from? We're saved from self. We're saved from the sin that
we are. We're saved from the world. We're saved from Satan.
We're saved unto eternal life because of our sure foundation
by his own blood. By his own will begat he his
people. And he is the sure foundation
for his people because of his work. This is the foundation that's
laid by God. And it is our hope of eternal
life. Come what may, we're in a society
right now that's full of fear. And we get caught up with the
fears also, don't we? We look around, you won't find any comfort
in the world. You have any happiness at all,
go ahead and turn the TV on the news and you'll lose it really
quick. But in a world that has no hope, we have real hope in
the Lord Jesus Christ, our firm foundation. Come what may, we
have an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, the Lord
Jesus Christ. We have a firm foundation, a
constant foundation, and we have a foundation that is sure in
the Lord Jesus Christ.