Leviticus chapter 19. Now, as
we mentioned the first hour, Leviticus shows us something
of the holiness of the Lord. It shows us His demands in worship,
that it's Christ alone. It shows us how He must be worshipped,
that it's in spirit and in truth alone, because God is a spirit.
They that worship must worship in spirit and in truth. It's important that we understand
that there's no way that we can worship God unless he causes
us to worship him. These instances that the Lord's
giving here, these laws, these commandments and ordinances that
the Lord's purpose to give in Leviticus to the children of
Israel, we don't partake in these ordinances or instances. Christ
is the fulfillment of all this. Christ was the one that all of
these things that take place, he was the one that they were
done for as a type and as a picture. Now Leviticus chapter 19 gives
us some good news, some good news. And as I mentioned at the
start of this service, You shall know the truth. You shall know,
shall means that you're going to because he's purposed it.
Here's the good news in Leviticus chapter 19, verse one. And the
Lord spake unto Moses saying, speak into all the congregation
of the children of Israel and say unto them, ye shall be holy. You shall be holy. For I, the
Lord, your God am holy. If we desire to worship, then
we are desiring to be found in Christ. We are desiring to confess
whatever the Lord has said is truth. We are desiring to be
holy. That's what we're desiring. And
the only way that we could be holy, the only way that we could
be set apart, sanctified, is if we're in the Lord Jesus Christ,
because he's holy. If we are in the Lord Jesus Christ,
we are viewed as holy as he is. It might sound like I'm repeating
myself from the first hour, but that's the good news of the gospel
to the believer. I wanna hear that all the time, that I'm holy
in Christ. I'm complete in Christ, my sin
has been put away. If you've been made a sinner,
and if I look at you and tell you that you're holy, you're
sitting there, no doubt in your mind, you're thinking, there
is no way I'm holy, but that's what the Lord said, you are before
him if you're in Christ. Isn't that glorious? That's the
glorious good news of the gospel. We see that the Lord's election
is predominant throughout the Bible. There's no doubt about
the Lord's election and salvation. I love salvation by election. That's the only way salvation
could have been. If it was up to me in any way, shape or form
or anything that I was supposed to do or merit, I would have
dropped the ball. I would not have been able to
do it. I would never have been able to keep these ordinances
the way that they needed to be kept. If this book, Leviticus,
if this was written and you and I had to do this in order to
be saved, we would mess it up. There's no doubt about it. There's
no doubt about it. But thanks be to God, everything
required for our salvation is in the Lord Jesus Christ and
it's by election. That's my hope. We see the Lord's
election is predominant in the priest Aaron and his sons. Now
I want us to understand something. Aaron and his sons, they were
not holy men. The scripture talks about the
holy men of old. The only reason that a man is
holy is because they're in Christ. The only reason Noah found grace
in the eyes of the Lord was not because Noah was a good man,
but it was because he was found in Christ before the foundation
of the world. There's our hope. If we are in
Christ, then we have been set aside for his glory, for his
honor in the person of Christ. Now turn back with me a few pages
to Leviticus chapter 10, Aaron and his sons were not holy,
as far as man is concerned. And the evidence of that, brethren,
is whenever we read the first hour in chapter one, that Aaron
had to offer up a sacrifice for himself before he could offer
up a sacrifice for the people. That's evident to me that they
were not holy in and of themselves. They were nothing special. We
live in a day and time of clergy worship, and it's always been
that way since the very beginning, whenever religion started taking
place, men like to set themselves up above the people. We see the
Pharisees and Sadducees did it in Christ's day, didn't we? They're
doing it today in different forms, but the most predominant one's
probably Catholicism, where a man says that he's holy, and you
have to go to him and confess your sins unto him. It's utter
blasphemy is what it is. We confess unto Christ, and he's
faithful and just to forgive us our sins. That's who we confess
to. We confess to the one that is
holy. We don't confess to a man. We confess to the man, the Lord
Jesus Christ. So we see here this picture of
Aaron and his sons. They were elected. It takes election
in order for them to even be in the position that they're
in as priests. It was the Lord's doing that
put them there. And we would be wise to learn here of what
is transpiring in Leviticus chapter 10. The Lord has given unto them
already the ordinances. He's already given unto them.
He's let them know that he is holy. And if you're going to
approach me, this is how you're going to do it. I'm going to
make you do it, and you're going to do it this way. But Nadab
and Abihu here, they do not honor the Lord's word. Let's read this
together. Leviticus chapter 10, verse one says, And Nadab and
Abihu, the sons of Aaron, took either of them, his censer, and
put fire therein, and put incense thereon, and offered strange
fire before the Lord, which he commanded them not. And there
went out fire from the Lord and devoured them, and they died
before the Lord. And Moses said unto Aaron, this
is it that the Lord spake, saying, I will be sanctified in them
that come nigh me, and before all the people I will be glorified,
and Aaron held his peace." Now, this thing of worship that we're
talking about this morning, the Lord is very serious about. As
you look over the course of the children of Israel, you'll see
that they murmured and they complained against God and against everything
the Lord had told them to do, but yet the Lord did not utterly
consume them then, did he? When did the Lord instantly kill
someone? It's whenever that they messed
with the holy things, the worship of God. This is what you and
I are trying to do right now is worship. It's a holy thing.
It is a serious thing, not to be taken lightly. The fire that
these men brought is the same thing. as bringing your works
unto the Lord, what you've produced. The Lord was very specific in
telling them, get coals from off the altar and put in the
censer. We heard about that the first
hour, but they brought fire that the Lord had not sanctified.
They brought fire that they produced themselves. They brought the
works of their hands before the Lord. They took worship too lightly. Do we see that? Christ was not
enough for them. That's what all of the pictures
represent is Christ. It represents his salvation for
his people. So as they're bringing the censer
full of incense, it did not go up unto the Lord as a sweet smelling
savor because it was not something that he produced. It must come
from him if he's gonna be pleased with it. The good news of the
gospel is brethren, everything that was required for your salvation,
everything, the Lord Jesus Christ, produced it himself. He produced
the faith that he bestows upon his people so that we believe
him. He produced the works that was pleasing unto the father.
And because of substitution, they become our works. Do we
see the good news in that? So Nadab and Abihu devalued the
worship of God. They devalued his word, which
is the Lord Jesus Christ. They devalued Christ is what
they did. Brethren, we should take worship seriously, and we
do. The Lord's people take it more
serious than anybody else. We know that this is not just
a social gathering where we get together. We know that. We know
that we're here for one reason. That's to see his face. We know
that. We see a lot of entertainers happening today, entertainment
happening in churches, don't we? A lot of people take, they're
not worshiping God anyways, but I'm just saying that their attempt
to worship God is the same thing that happened here, bringing
in the censor of the fire that they created. They're trying
to, I remember in religion, they talk about, we have revivals,
and I guess several of you probably know what that is. A revival
is whenever they would get together for a service and it would continue
for a week or two weeks or however long, and they would keep talking
about how there's a fire burning now. We got a good fire going.
That's what they would talk about. They would get more excited and
they would get more rambunctious. They would get more boisterous.
That's not of the Lord. The Lord speaks in a still, small
voice, doesn't he? The Lord is not going to be worked
up. The Holy Spirit never draws attention
to himself. He speaks in a still small voice
and we must approach him with his fire with his ways, not our
ways, not our works, his works. The question I would ask us this
morning is, do we believe the Word of God? Do we believe that
it's the inherent Word of God? Do we believe in the Lord Jesus
Christ? Do we believe on Him as all in
salvation? If so, we're going to approach
God the way that God has said, this is how you seek my face.
When I said unto you, seek my face, then my heart said unto
you, O Lord, thy face will I seek. We understand that God is not
approachable by us. We cannot just walk into His
presence. Do you remember in the book of
Esther, whenever Esther was going to go before the king, if the
king did not raise up his scepter, whenever she was to enter into
that room, she was to be taken and killed. That's how serious
it was to enter into the king's presence. You had to be called
into the king's presence. So she knew that if she was going
to save her people, she had to approach the king. But she also
knew that if she approached the king and did not find favor in
his eyes, he would kill her. Now we know that whenever she
entered the room, he lifted the scepter up to her, didn't he?
Is that not a picture of our Lord Jesus Christ approaching
his father on our behalf and the Lord was satisfied with him?
You and I can't enter into the throne room of God on our own
merits. The scepter will not be raised.
He's only pleased with one, and that is the Lord Jesus Christ.
He's only pleased with his work. He's only pleased with his life,
his death. That's why he resurrected him,
is because he was satisfied with him. The scripture says, Abraham believed
God. That's what we do. We believe
the Lord is all in salvation. But Abraham didn't believe God
because Abraham was a good man. Now, sure, he might've been good
by man's standards, and a lot of men wanna hear that. Boy,
he's such a good guy. Nobody wants to hear, well, this
guy's just bad. He's just a bad guy, and I don't
wanna be around him. I can't stand to be around him. Nobody wants
to hear that. But what do they mean by saying a good man? Well,
they're valuing one man over another based upon their actions.
That's not how God does. Either you're in Christ as perfectly
righteous, Either you're in the good man or you're nothing but
sin, lost. Your righteousness is as filthy
rags. You're a leper, you're unpure, you're unfit, unholy. But in Christ Jesus, every one
of those things I just mentioned become the opposite. We are holy,
sanctified, set apart. We've already been glorified
in him. We're seated at the right hand of God. We are made perfectly
righteous. Abraham believed God because
Abraham was in Christ. Do we see that? The only way
that you're gonna believe God is if God comes to you and arrests
you and says unto you, seek my face, believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ. The only way that we're gonna
be saved is if he does all the saving. And he did all the saving
for his people, didn't he? Nahab and Abihu didn't see it
this way. They wanted to bring something
unto the Lord and worship him. some other way. They didn't see
God as God. They didn't value him as God. If they would have, they would
have got the cults from off the altar, wouldn't they? But they
didn't. Did you know that there is no difference? There is no
difference in the world between the atheist and the religionists
of the world. No difference between an atheist
and a Catholic. No difference in an atheist and a Baptist. They both do not believe God
is God. If you believe that the Lord
Jesus Christ is God, if you believe that the Lord Jesus Christ is
God, you're a believer. Because that means you believe
that he successfully saved his people. You believe that he is
sovereign and he has the sovereign right to choose whomsoever he
will and pass by others. If you believe that Jesus Christ
is God, you're a believer. That is our hope is that he would
cause us to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Not take it lightly,
Not take it, not be frivolous about the Lord's worship, but
approach him in the blood of Christ alone. That's our hope. In the book of Numbers, I'll
tell you what, let's read, let's read verse three again. Then
Moses said unto Aaron, this, this is it that the Lord spake
saying, I will be sanctified in them. Now, what does it mean
to be sanctified? That word means honored. I will
be honored by all those that approach me. That's what he's
saying here. I will be sanctified in them that come nigh me. Now,
the only way that we can approach, and I've already said this once,
but the only way that we can approach the Lord is being found
in Christ. If we come nigh unto him, he
will be glorified. He'll either be glorified in
our damnation for eternity, or he'll be glorified in our salvation
by Christ alone. The Lord will get all the glory.
He created this earth. He owns it. The earth is the
Lord's and the fullness thereof. Everything that is breathing
is his and he can do with it whatsoever he will. You and I
love it that way, don't we? We know that the only way that
we were, if we were gonna be saved, it had to be done of him,
all by him, all by himself. And he did that for his people. Somebody said, well, it sounds
to me like you're telling me that if. It's his way or the
highway. You ever heard that expression
is where the highway? No, that's not what I'm telling us. I'm
telling us it's his way or tail. That's what I'm telling us. That's
it. This is the God that we're trying to worship right now.
He is serious about his worship. He will get glory. All the glory
belongs to him. The Lord's people come to him
on the merits of Christ alone. Bow unto him in Christ alone. Now, in the book of Numbers,
I was gonna mention this a minute ago, but in the book of Numbers,
we see that the children of Israel had gathered together, and there
was a man by the name of Korah. I preached a message to us one
time while we were still at the conference, and I can't remember
if we had moved up here or if it was just prior, but the scripture
talks about Korah, going after the gainsaying of Korah. Korah
was jealous of Moses and Aaron because they were the priests.
They were the ones that was getting the attention, if you want to
put it that way. They didn't like the popularity of Moses.
And actually, he goes and he accused him. He said, you're
just setting yourself up to be above us, is the accusation that
took place. Moses is speaking unto Korah
and they bring the censors. We were talking about the censors
before the service, they bring the censers unto Moses, and Moses
says, okay, well, you burn incense in yours, which is the type of
worship that we've been talking about the last hour, and we're
gonna burn incense in ours, and he tells us in Numbers 16, verse
five, Moses said to Korah and all his company, saying, even
tomorrow the Lord will show who are his. The Lord will show who
are his and who is holy. Who are his and who is holy. And then he asked him a question,
Moses does. He says, seemeth it a small thing to you? Does
it seem a small thing to you that the Lord hath made the Levites
the priest? Does worship seem a small thing
to us? That would be a question I would
ask us. Does worship seem as just a small thing? No, certainly
not. Not to worship the king. It's serious, isn't it? We desire
to worship as his people. Now, you know what happened?
In that account, we see that whenever they started burning
their incense, that the Lord literally opened up the earth
and swallowed up 250 men. Everything about them went down
to the pit, the scripture says, down to the pit. The Lord opened
up the earth, swallowed them. Then he says he sent fire from
heaven to rain upon them and consume them. The same fire,
the same fire that consumed these two men, Nadab and Abihu, the
exact same fire. What does that fire represent?
That represents the wrath of God, doesn't it? It is the wrath
of God. Now understand when the Lord
Jesus Christ was on the cross, the fire of God's wrath fell
upon him. Whenever we approach the Lord,
if we are not in Christ, that is all that's gonna be declared
unto us is wrath and judgment. We must be in Christ and we must
take his worship seriously. Turn over a couple pages with
me to Leviticus chapter 16. The scripture talks about will-worship
and what it means by will-worship is you're willing, you're trying
to worship God by your own works. You're trying to please God by
what you produce. The scripture refers to this
as will-worship. And another example of that would be, you
remember the account of Uzzah. Uzzah, the children of Israel
had lost the ark to the Philistines and the Philistines were cursed
by it. And it's interesting because
the Lord gave them hemorrhoids is what he gave them. And somebody
says to me one time, well, what you're speaking on is a pain
unto me or irks me. It makes me, well, that's exactly
what the Lord's word does is it cuts and divides, right? So
some people, it may be a pain in their backside, but to us,
it's the good news of the gospel, isn't it? Us and the children,
David goes down to fetch the ark is how it transpires. And
the ark is up on a cart. Now understand something, that
was something the Philistines had to show them to do. They
knew better than to put it up on the ark. What is that a picture
of? Propping up the word of God or propping up the work of Christ
by something we do. That's what that's a picture
of. They were to use staves to carry the ark. The four priests
would use the staves to carry the ark. That was the responsibility,
not to be propped up, but to be carried, to be lifted up by
the priest. There's a difference, isn't there?
What we're trying to do right now, brethren, is we're trying
to lift up the Lord Jesus Christ by preaching upon him, not prop
him up. That's totally different. Do
we see that? But they were walking back, and as they were, the ark
was on the cart, and it began to rock, and it looked like it
was gonna fall, and Uzzah retched up, and he was gonna help. He
was going to keep the ark of God, the mercy seat, what we've
been talking about, the mercy seat, the holy things of God.
He was going to prevent it from falling. That seems like a pretty
good intention to me. Does it? You, God said, don't
touch it. And as I thought, well, I'm going
to not let it fall. I have to do something. That's
what men do by nature. There must be something I can
do. There has to be something I need to do in order to be saved. No, To be saved, the Lord says,
believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you don't produce the faith
to believe. If you believe it's because he's made you do it.
Uzzah retched up, didn't he? And he touched the ark. What
happened to him? God killed him instantly, didn't he? God killed
him instantly. And David was full of fear at
that moment. And David left the ark there. He said, I had it all wrong.
I did not realize how holy the Lord was. He had to think that
because he left the ark there and went back to Jerusalem at
that time, or went back to Israel. And the interesting part is,
is it sat there for three months. That's a long time for it to,
David processing, how are we going to get this ark? Because
he, they desired to worship God. That's why they fetched the ark
to begin with. Without the ark, there is no worship brethren.
And that ark represents the Lord Jesus Christ. Without the finished
work of Christ, there is no worship. We must look only to his work. David ends up going back down
and getting the ark, but the scripture says that he puts an
ephod on, which is a priestly garment. And every six paces,
they make a sacrifice unto the Lord. Every six paces. What does that mean? Well, six
is the number of man, isn't it? David was confessing every six
paces, I am unworthy of this mercy seat. I am unworthy of
the blood that atones for me. I'm unworthy in everything. I'm
nothing but sin. And I'm confessing that every
six paces they would stop and make a sacrifice. Is that what
we do when we come and worship? It is, isn't it? We come into
the Lord's house confessing we are unworthy. Christ is all.
And every second that passes by, we're just begging, Lord,
cause us to see your face. Show us your glory. Show us,
look, see us in your mercy. See us in grace and in love.
Give us Christ alone. We do that every six paces, but
that's literally every second for us while we're here, isn't
it? That's our life. That's what we do. We confess
that Christ is all just as David was doing. Now we're in Leviticus
chapter 16. Look at verse number one. And the Lord spake unto Moses
after the death of the two sons of Aaron, when they offered before
the Lord and died. And the Lord said unto Moses,
speak unto Aaron thy brother, that he come not at all times
into the holy place within the veil before the mercy seat, which
is upon the ark, that he die not. For I will appear in the
cloud upon the mercy seat. Thus shall Aaron come into the
holy place for a young bullock for a sin offering and a ram
for a burnt offering. He shall put on the holy linen
coat and he shall have the linen breeches upon his flesh and shall
be girded with a linen girdle and with a linen miter shall
he be attired. These are the holy garments.
Now in order for him to put these on, this is what has to happen.
Therefore shall he wash his flesh in water and so put them on. The Lord's telling them here,
you can't come into me at any time you choose. The only time
that you can approach the veil, the only time that you can go
where the mercy seat is, is when it appears a cloud, when the
cloud appears. Now, what is that a picture of?
We heard the first hour, that was the cloud that ascended upon
Mount Calvary. Whenever the Lord Jesus Christ
offered as the lamb slain before the foundation of the world as
he died, and he was doing business with God, darkness fell, didn't
it? The only way that you and I have
any hope of approaching God is to come through and by that veil,
the Lord Jesus Christ, His flesh. That's our only hope. The only
way that we can worship God and enter into the holy place is
by His blood alone. That's what the scripture said
Christ did. By His own blood, He entered in once into the holy
place. Why? Having obtained eternal
redemption for us. And this cloud would appear We
see that that's whenever the Lord is to be worshiped. And
that's the only way that you and I could worship is the Lord
Jesus Christ had to die. He had to die for you and I to
no longer have separation, but union with God. And he did for
his people. Now verse five says, and he shall
take of the congregation of the children of Israel, two kids
of the goats for a sin offering. and one ram for a burnt offering.
And Aaron shall offer his bullock of the sin offering, which is
for himself, and make atonement for himself, for his house. Now
look at this. He shall take two goats, two
goats, and present them before the Lord at the door of the tabernacle
of the congregation. And Aaron shall cast lots upon
the two goats, and one lot for the Lord, and the other lot for
the scapegoat. And Aaron shall bring the goat
upon which the Lord's lot fell and offer him for a sin offering. But the goat on which the lot
fell to be the scapegoat shall be presented alive before the
Lord to make an atonement with him and to let him go for a scapegoat
into the wilderness. Now, do we see the picture here
of this goat? as being one is set free that
bears the sin. We're gonna see that in a second.
But that was the whole purpose of these two goats. One was unto
the Lord as a sacrifice, and one was to be set free as a scapegoat,
bearing the sin out into the wilderness. Now, the Lord Jesus
Christ is the only one that could be offered for our sin, offered
as the sinner substitute, bearing our sin unto the Lord as our
scapegoat also. Do we see that? He's the only
one that could do both, and he did. He was the one that became
the scapegoat for the Lord's people. They brought this goat
in, two goats. They brought these two goats
and they said, okay, one of them is going to be offered up unto
the Lord as a sacrifice. and the other is going to be
set free into the wilderness, bearing the sin. The one for
the sacrifice was unto the Lord. The other one was just cast as
far as the east is from the west, if you want to think of it that
way. Cast into the wilderness, cast into the abyss. And that's
what the Lord did for his people. He bore their sin as the sinner
substitute, as the sacrifice unto the Lord, went into outer
darkness for you and I, to the darkest places of the Lord's
wrath and satisfied His wrath and justice before the Father
as our scapegoat. Deuteronomy 7, verse 8 says,
but because the Lord loved you, isn't that a glorious thought
that the Lord would love me? It's too wonderful to think that
the holy God that we're talking about would love me. We hear
constantly, An election is glorious to preach. I talked to someone
on the phone this week, I can't remember who it was, but we were
talking about how there's many Calvinists that died and went
to hell. We don't just preach a doctrine, brethren, we preach
Christ. We preach Christ. Christ is salvation. Calvinism
is not salvation. I mean, if you look over, it
could be just as any other religion at that point. You just put a
different title on it. Christ is salvation. Christ is
salvation. What I'm trying to tell us, Right
now is that. The Lord loves us as his people. He love he really loves his people
that are in Christ. That is good news to me that
he would love me a center that he would love me so much that
he would die for me that he was resurrected for me. We need to
speak more upon the love of God, don't we? You can never exhaust
it. You can never speak about it too much. Yes, we speak on
the holiness of the Lord, but he loves with the perfect love.
He loves with the Holy love. His love is good and it's for
his people because the Lord loved you and because he would keep
the oath which he had sworn unto your fathers at the Lord brought
you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you out of the house
of the bondman. I want you to. Look over. to verse 21 and 22 of the same
passage. He just you heard me just read
that we were brought out with a mighty hand. I look here at
the verse 21. And Aaron shall lay both his
hands upon the head of the live goat and confess over him all
the iniquities of the children of Israel and all their transgressions
and all their sins, putting them upon the head of the goat and
shall send him away by the hand of a fit man into the wilderness. Now that word, a fit man, literally
means the man of opportunity. So we, See the picture here of
Aaron laying his hands upon the head of this goat and confessing
all the sins. And then a fit man, a man that was able, a man
that was capable, a man of opportunity would take that goat out into
the wilderness and there he would set it free. When the fullness of time was
come, God sent forth his son. in the likeness of sinful flesh
and for sin condemned sin in the flesh. At the opportune moment,
whenever the Lord Jesus Christ was hanging naked before the
world at the opportune moment, the fit man, the only one that
was worthy, the only one that was able to redeem the fit man
at the opportune moment, the Lord smote him with the rod of
justice, saving his people from their sin. Our scapegoat went
into the wilderness for His people, went into the darkness for His
people, where nothing, the emptiness, went into the place, the dark
place of the Lord's wrath so that it would be satisfied, so
that He would be satisfied. Now hold your place here and
turn over to Romans 2. The Lord Jesus Christ. I've titled
I forgot to even tell you the title of this message is that
God's not a respecter of persons and we're about to see that in
Romans chapter two. But I want us to understand something. We
live in a society right now that constantly says things such as
don't judge me and what they mean by that is is don't think
yourself better than me or don't look down upon me or whatever
else. God judged his son on the cross of Calvary. Think about
that. God judged Christ and saw my sin and put his son to death. The Lord Jesus Christ was judged
of God. Whenever the Lord saw that sin,
he had to execute his son. So if we're talking about judgment,
that is judgment. That's what the Lord demanded
if sin is present, is death. For the wages of sin is death,
but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our
Lord. Now look right here in verse number, you're in Romans
chapter two, and I want you to look at one
verse, verse 11. For there is no respect of persons
with God. There is no respect of persons
with God. If we were to read this entire
chapter, and we don't have time right now, but we can see that
the Lord judges in holiness, the Lord judges in truth, and
the Lord makes righteous judgments. The Lord's the only one that
can judge, because he's the only one that's holy. He's the only one
that's perfect. He's the only one that could satisfy justice. The example of justice that I
can give us is if someone was to murder someone, and then they
were killed themselves, people would call that justice. That's
not justice. Justice would be the one that was murdered to
be resurrected from the dead, and then the other one would
die in their stead. That's justice, and that's what the Lord did
for his people. Justice was satisfied only one time, and that was on
the cross, when the Lord Jesus Christ was judged of his father.
Now, what we just read, that God is no respecter of persons,
it's very important that we understand. He's not saying that everyone's
gonna have an opportunity of salvation, that God's no respecter
of persons. That's not what the Lord's telling
us here. What God is telling us here is that if he spared
not his own son, but killed his son when he saw sin upon him.
Is he going to respect you when he sees sin upon you? Is he going
to respect me if he sees sin upon me? No, God's no respecter
of person. He saw sin upon his darling son
and he executed his son for his people so that we might be made
the righteousness of God in him. Flee to Christ. Don't try to
come on your own merits. Don't come before him thinking
that you're good in any way. Flee to Christ. Beg for Christ.
If the Lord saw sin upon his son and he did and he spared
not his own son, is he going to spare us if he sees it upon
us? No, he's not a respecter of person. We must be found in the Lord
Jesus Christ. Now quickly go back to our text
in Leviticus 16. God is not a respecter of person.
That doesn't mean that everyone's going to have an opportunity.
That means we must be found in Christ. That's our only hope. Now, Exodus 16 and verse 22,
and the goat shall bear upon him all their iniquities unto
a land not inhabited, and he shall let go the goat into wilderness. Now, I know I've already said
this, but I want to reiterate this to us again, the Lord Jesus Christ,
What he did is the good news of the gospel. It is our only
hope. And so I want to reiterate that as many times as I can when
I stand up here, but I never want to kind of go back in circles
and speak over the same thing and just keep repeating myself
over. But I think that's what I do most of the time, because
that's how the gospel is to be declared. Just continually hit
the same nail on the head. The Lord was led into the uninhabited
land. He was cut off. from the land
of the living, the scripture says. The Lord did that for his
people. What does that mean, cut off
from the land of the living? I don't know. I just know he
was cut off from the land of the living. That's what it says,
so that's what it means. He entered in death for you and
I, so that we do not have to fear death. Our scapegoat, the
Lord Jesus Christ, bore the sin bore the sin of the elect on
the cross and died for them so that we might be made the righteousness
of God in him. He spared not his own son, but
delivered him up freely for us all. He saw sin upon him and
he is no respecter of person. When he sees sin, justice must
be satisfied. Leviticus chapter 19. I read
this to us earlier, so you've already heard it once. But it
says, and the Lord spake unto Moses saying, speak into all
the congregation of the children of Israel and say unto them,
ye shall be holy. For I, the Lord your God, am
holy. Brethren, we're viewed as holy before the Father. God
is no respecter of person. The only way that we're going
to be seen as holy is to be found in Christ. But thanks be to God,
He has allowed us to worship Him. He has allowed us to approach
Him in the person of Christ. He has saved His people from
their sin. I'm thankful for the scapegoat. I probably should have titled
this the scapegoat. I don't know, but I'm thankful for the scapegoat,
the Lord Jesus Christ. And I'm thankful that the Lord
is not a respecter of person. That gives me hope because if
He respected you over me, that means you would have salvation
and I wouldn't. He's not a respecter of person. He only respects one,
the Lord Jesus Christ. we must be found in Him. Father,
thank You for Your Word. Lord, cause us to rest in the
scapegoat. Cause us to rest in Christ. Lord, cause us to see
more of Him and less of ourself. Cause us not to trust in anything
in and of ourself. Cause us to trust in the Lord
Jesus Christ. It's in His name we pray, Amen.