Last week we spoke on zeros and
the one. And I told you all that we're
going to go through numbers of the Bible, not the book, but
literal numbers. And what do they pertain to or
what they mean by the Lord's, um, some of the things that he
used, such as one where a bunch of zeros I mentioned last week,
but if you put a one in front of a bunch of zeros, it becomes
a pretty big number, don't it? And so that's our hope is the
Lord did that for us, for his people. So tonight I'm going
to preach on two made one, the number two. And I'd like to look
at a couple of different places where the Lord has used the number
two in scripture. The first thing that came to
mind when I started studying the number two was the law and
the prophets. The law and the prophets are also the two witnesses
that the Lord saw on Mount Transfiguration whenever the veil of his flesh
fell off and he was in his glory and the disciples that were with
him saw. two men talking to him. And that was Moses and Elijah
that represented the law and the prophets. They hear a voice
that came from heaven. Actually, Peter started talking
as soon as that happened immediately after. I love Peter because I
can relate to Peter so much. Peter opens up his mouth before
he even knows what to say. And he says, Lord, it's good
that we were here. Let's build three temples, one for you and
one for Elijah and one for Moses. And the Lord doesn't even say
anything to him because he's rebuked by the father from glory. The voice, an audible voice that
came down from heaven that says, this is my beloved son, hear
ye him. What he's telling him is, is
don't look to the law for your salvation. You can consider the
prophets but they prophesied of Christ. That's the hope that
we have. So the law and the prophets tell us, they point us to Christ.
Turn with me, if you will, to Matthew chapter 22. The Lord
spoke on this, on the law and the prophets. And we see that men today are
still looking to the law for their righteousness, aren't they?
They're still looking to prophecies. Men are saying that they know,
I remember, There was a book, and I was young, there was a
book that came out in 1988, and it said 88 reasons that God will
come back for his people in 88. That was the idea. They sold
a million copies of it, because everybody wants to know the future,
don't they? We already know the future, don't we, brethren? It's
already been revealed to us what's gonna happen, and you can look
in the book of Revelation where a lot of these men get their
ideas from, and the title of Revelation literally says, a
revelation, the, I'm not a, I'm sorry, the revelation of Jesus
Christ. In the volume of the book, it's
written of him, and everything that was spoken by the law and
the prophets pointed to one thing. It was the successful Savior,
the Lord Jesus Christ. They all spoke of him. You're
in Matthew chapter 22, look at verse 34. He says, but when the
Pharisees had heard that he had put the Sadducees to silence,
they were gathered together, Then one of them, which was a
lawyer, asked him a question, tempting him and saying, Master,
which is the greatest, which is the great commandment in the
law? Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt
love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul
and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. The second is likened to it.
Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. On these two commandments
hang all the law and the prophets. on these two commandments. Do
you know why that is? Because brethren, we cannot love
the Lord our God with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength.
We cannot. We are utterly sinful and even our love is so conditional. Now God's love is
conditional as well. It's conditioned upon the person
of the Lord Jesus Christ. But if you're in Christ, then
you know that he loves you and always has loved you and never
will stop loving you. I love my children very much,
but and I never stopped loving them, but to say that our love
is not conditional is just foolish because somebody kicks you enough,
you're gonna stop going around that person. You're not gonna
forget what happened. Now, the Lord, whenever he loves, it's
with a holy love. It's with a perfect love, and
he loves his people. So it's not possible for us to
keep this law, even as the Lord said here, This is the great
commandment. The second's likened to the first,
love thy neighbor as thyself. We don't love our neighbor as
ourself. We don't have the capability
in our flesh to do that. We love ourself too much. That's
the problem. We want to be God. The only way
that we bow into a sovereign Lord is if he causes us to bow
to him. So the law clearly states that
man is utterly sinful. Man is born speaking lies from
the mother's womb. He's born in sin, shapen into
iniquity. that the heart of man is deceitful
above all things and desperately wicked, who can know it? The
Lord tells us that there's none that doeth good, no, not one,
for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. This
is what the law shows a man, how a man is. It shows us that
God is holy, that God is just, that God demands justice. The
prophets stated that there would be a redeemer to come to redeem
us from under the law. And his name is Jesus Christ,
it's already happened. But the law shows us that we
cannot get to God and the prophets prophesied of the one that could
touch God and not be destroyed and touch man and not be defiled
because he was made the God-man Jesus Christ. Under the Levitical law, two
witnesses were required to validate any testimony. Deuteronomy chapter
17. In second Corinthians chapter 13 verse one, it says in the
mouth of two or three witnesses shall every word be established.
Now understand, brethren, the reason that two was given, the
law and the prophets, to point us to Christ is because of the
requirement for two in the Levitical law to validate a testimony.
We have two witnesses that Jesus Christ is all from Genesis to
Malachi. Genesis to Malachi is written
about Jesus Christ. Don't misunderstand. It's called
the Old Testament. I understand that, but it is
a book, the entire volume, the entire canon of scripture is
written about the Lord Jesus Christ. Men can't see that because
they see stories. They see through, not through
the eyes of faith, but to the Lord's people. We can rejoice
in knowing, we can see as we saw this last Sunday, we talked
about Joseph being down in the, prison house of Pharaoh. We saw
him, how, what represented, he representing Christ there and
all that transpired. We have the revelation of Jesus
Christ by the Lord's spirit. And we have these two witnesses. Paul said, for I've delivered
unto you, first of all, that which I also receive, how that
Christ died for our sins, according to the scriptures, and that he
was buried and that he rose again the third day, according to the
scriptures. Well, what scriptures was he
talking about? He's talking about the entire Old Testament. The
New Testament was being written by Paul right then when he put
that down. He died, Christ Jesus died according to the scriptures.
Now, in every religion, men will talk about the death, burial,
and the resurrection of Christ, but they won't declare it as
accomplishing salvation. They'll declare it as him making
an offering, and there's something that he left out that a man has
to do, and that's not true. We know that it was salvation
accomplished because he died according to the scriptures.
All prophecy was fulfilled in the person of Jesus Christ. The
law was satisfied in the person of Jesus Christ, and we have
the two witnesses that declare Christ is all. Christ is all. The law and the prophets declare.
How God is just. and the justifier of sinners.
The Scripture declares that God must be, His justice must be
satisfied. It must be satisfied. No attribute
of God could be compromised in any way. He would not change
Himself in order to save a man. He is God. He is omnipotent. He is omniscient. He's on the
present. He is God. He reigns. And He
will not change His attributes to save a man. So God became
a man. Man, He was born in a robe of
sinful flesh. Think about that. Robed in sinful
flesh, enforced sin, condemned sin in the flesh. Christ fulfilled
the law according to the Scriptures. All the prophecies that were
given were fulfilled in the person of Jesus Christ. Christ said in Romans chapter,
Paul said in Romans chapter 10, verse four, for Christ is the
end of law, end of the law for righteousness to everyone that
believeth. A man would say, well, all I
have to do then is believe. Well, yes, that's true, but we
don't have the capability of believing on our own. The call
goes out, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be
saved. Absolutely. But it takes faith to believe
the laws and the prophets pointed, the law and prophets pointed
to Christ. We can't see that. Christ said it this way, think
not that I am come to destroy the law of the prophets. I'm
not to come to destroy, but to fulfill. The Pharisees and Sadducees would
often talk about the writings of the scripture, wouldn't they?
They'd often talk about the laws and the prophets unto the Lord.
And the Lord said, well, search the scriptures for in them, you
think you have eternal life. You think keeping the law is
going to give you eternal life. But he said, they are these which
testified of me. So we see the two that the Lord
used are the law and the prophets in the Old Testament to point
us to the Lord Jesus Christ. The entire volume of the book
is written of Christ. Every number, every letter, every
law, all the prophets, everything that's ever been given down to
every letter, it's of him, it's by him and it's for him and his
glory. It points us to the Lord Jesus Christ and his work. And there's many other twos that
the Lord used in the Scripture. We heard Sunday morning about
the body and the blood of Christ, the wine and the bread. And He
said, if you eat of My body and you drink of My blood, you have
life, eternal life. He that eateth not, he's condemned. The Lord gave His body. He gave
His blood for His people. He said, my body is meat indeed,
and my blood is drink indeed. These are two things that the
Lord has given to us that we hold on to, that we look to for
our salvation. In another part of the scripture,
he talks about the water and the word. He said that he might
sanctify and cleanse it, referring to the church. He might sanctify
and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word. He confirms
these two. by saying in Titus 3, 5, not
by works of righteousness, which we have done, but according to
his mercy, he saved us by the washing of regeneration and renewing
of the Holy Ghost. So this is how two are made into
one. The gospel is preached. God washes
his people by the preaching of the gospel in the blood of Christ.
He regenerates them by his spirit. And we feast on the body and
blood of Christ because of this. The number two is a wonderful
number in the scripture. And I hope tonight I can declare
it to you like the Lord revealed it to me. Half the time I get
in my own way and I try to say something and then I back up
and think I didn't say that right. Didn't say this right, but I'm
I'm encouraged that the Lord Alan I was talking before service
and I'm encouraged to be reminded that in our weakness. In our
weakness, his strength is made perfect. The Lord is faithful
to deliver us, even as we try to speak on things that we don't
understand, even as we try to declare the gospel of Christ,
he delivers us, he gives you ears to hear, and he loosed my
tongue enough for me to speak, but he has to send his spirit.
And that's what I'm speaking about right now, this union that
he's given us one with him, his spirit, and our spirit, our new
man, First John chapter five, verse
five says, who is he that overcometh the world, but he that believeth
that Jesus is the son of God. This is he that came by water
and blood, even Jesus Christ, not water only, but by water
and blood. And it is the spirit that beareth
witness because the spirit is truth. God has quickened us together. He's united us unto him by his
spirit. Think about that. We are one
with Christ to have been made one in the Lord Jesus Christ. Nicodemus came to the Lord inquiring
on. How to have eternal life, well,
that's the question I think a lot of times men ask, not understanding. Most of the time when somebody
asks you your opinion, they already have the answer before they even
ask you. At least that's been the case in my life. Nicodemus
came to the Lord, genuinely seeking an answer for the question, what
must I do to inherit eternal life? And you know what the Lord
told him, you must be born again. And he said, how can a man, when
he is old, enter into his mother's room a second time and be born?
The Lord tells him, verily, verily, I say unto you, except a man
be born of water. And that's the gospel. That's the gospel
of Christ that goes forth, even as we try to do that right now.
Except a man be born of water and of the spirit. He cannot
enter to the kingdom of God. That which is born of flesh is
flesh. That which is born of the Spirit is spirit. So how
does he do this? He does it by his gospel. He
does it by the preaching of his gospel according to his will.
The gospel is likened to milk and honey in the scripture. Did
you know that? In the Old Testament, whenever the children of Israel
were going going to be brought out of Egypt, he tells them,
I'm gonna bring them to a land flowing with milk and honey.
And we see Paul refers to the milk of the word. He said, you
being babes desire the sincere milk of the word that you may
grow thereby. So the milk and honey that's mentioned, the two
there that's mentioned is the gospel. We come here to feed
off of the milk. It is a basic necessity for a
child to grow, a baby, an infant. That's all that they can drink
is the milk, is it not? They can't eat solid food. Matter
of fact, I tried to give solid food to one of my children at
too early and my wife got very upset with me because she got
choked up and everything else. I didn't understand how that
worked exactly, I suppose. But you can't give a baby solid
food, can you? You have to give them milk. And
brethren, we never grow past the milk. Do we see that? We
never get somebody said, well, I want to hear about the meat
and potatoes. That is the meat and potatoes. The gospel is the
same. It doesn't change. It's good news. It's his body.
It's his blood that we feast upon. It's the bread. And it's
the wine, and it is sweet and good. It is good to his people. Isaiah chapter seven, verse five
says, butter and honey. Now butter is the fat part of
milk. We understand that, right? That's the richest part of milk. Butter and honey shall he eat
that he may know to refuse evil and choose the good. The gospel
is sweet to the Lord's people. The fatness of the Lord's gospel
is good news to his people. The honey is sweet to our taste.
But I'm reminded in Revelation chapter 10, John was told to
take the little book. He took it and he ate it, the
scripture says, and it was in my mouth, sweet as honey. And
as soon as I had eaten it, it was bitter to my belly. What
does that mean? Well, that means to the new man,
the word of God is sweet. It tastes good. But to the old
man in our belly, it does not taste good. It is not sweet.
It's not good news to the flesh, to our flesh. Understand our
flesh is enmity against God. By nature, we hate everything
about God. We want to be God ourself. And the only way you
can know that is if you've been made to know that. But as enemies
against God being born in sin, shaping into iniquity, when we
hear the good news of the gospel, the new man rejoices. The new
man takes another breath. But the old man hates it. It's
offensive because it gives no glory. It gives no glory to the
flesh whatsoever. The Lord's people want it that
way. We hunger and thirst for righteousness. We hunger and
thirst for this honey and this milk. I'm still telling us about
twos that the Lord used in the Scripture. The honey and the
milk of the Lord. Because of these two natures,
warring against each other. I was reminded of a passage of
scripture we used to use in religion often, and we would use it as
a scare tactic because the question is, can a fountain bring forth
both sweet water and bitter? Well, that's two things right
there, sweet water and bitter water. But what we meant by that
in religion was, is if you say that you're a Christian, you
better act like a Christian. You better have sweet water that
comes out, not bitter water. Brethren, that's not what that's talking
about at all. Yes, it is true that the sweet water and bitter
are opposites, but if you're a believer, The only thing you
can produce is the sweet water of God. He doesn't see the bitter
water. Now, you may see yourself as a sinner. You're supposed
to. That's the way the Lord's designed it. So you cry out for
mercy. But he's given you faith to look to him. That's what he's
done for his people, giving you faith to look to him. God does
not see the bitter water that comes out of us. He does not
see our sin, because in his own body, he drank of the bitter
dregs of God's wrath for his people. He put away the sin of
God's elect forever. So can a fountain bring forth
sweet water and bitter? No, it only brings forth bitter
or sweet, period. And God's people bring forth
the sweet according to his purpose, according to his promise. And
the others can only bring forth bitter water. Do we see that?
Our old man and new man We see the difference. All we see is
the bitter water that we're producing, but God sees us in Christ. That's
the hope we have. He sees us in Christ, producing
sweet water. What is the sweet water? Well,
the water I mentioned already is likened to the word of God.
What is our confession? Christ is all according to the
scriptures. Christ is all according to the
law and the prophets. Christ is all, that's the sweet
water he's talking about. That's what comes out of our
lips. That's all we can produce because he's made us to believe
it. Our old man and new man are totally
opposites. That's two, old and new. Our
old man and new man, they're totally opposites of each other.
They're like oil and water. That's two different ones. They
don't mix, do they? You can't mix oil and water. They're like
darkness and light. And I find darkness interesting. The scripture says, God was speaking,
He said, I, I make light, I form the darkness. Now, we can't create
darkness. Think about that. We can't create
darkness. Darkness is the absence of light,
period. So when you remove the light,
it becomes darker and darker. But the Lord is the light himself
that is shined into the heart of his people. And he's dissipated. He's made the darkness go away.
He's made the darkness disappear. His light has shined into our
heart. And we all all we see is Christ.
In his finished work, that's what the light does. Our two. Our two natures. Or what warfare
is what our warfare is all about in this life are two natures.
The one that. Refuses to look to God and the
one that's been made to only look to God, and that's our hope.
That's our hope is the Lord would cause us to look to him that
our that Christ and us have been united in union together. Now the last place I want to
look is found in Luke chapter 23. Luke chapter 23. So we've heard of the two being
the Law and the Prophets. being the milk and the honey,
being the light and the darkness, the sweet water, the bitter water.
But I noticed that there's really, and I wrote an article about
this for Sunday, you can read it, but there's only two opinions
in the entire world of Jesus Christ. There's only two opinions.
There's only two confessions of man. Either Christ is all
in salvation or he's not. In the confession of a man, you
will know whether that sweet water comes forth or it's bitter
water, you'll know. The fountain will produce whatever
the heart has been made to believe according to the will of God.
So these two confessions are very simple and we find them
in Luke chapter 23 and verse 39. And one of the male factors
which were hanged railed on him saying, if thou be Christ, save
thyself and us. But the other answering rebuked
him saying, does not thou fear God seeing thou art in the same
condition? And we indeed justly, for we receive the due reward
of our deeds, that this man hath done nothing amiss. And he said
unto Jesus, Lord, remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom.
And Jesus said unto him, Verily I say unto thee, that today shalt
thou be with me in paradise. Brethren, if there was ever a
man in the scripture that I have full confidence that he was the
Lord's, it's this man right here. The Lord looks at him, or maybe
not looks at him, but he speaks to him beside of him and he says
today, you will be with me in paradise. You talk about assurance.
This man had assurance because of that. I find this interesting
that these two men were hanging on one side and the other side
of Christ, and they heard the same seven confessions from the
Lord's mouth on the cross. The Lord said, I thirst. The
Lord said, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Father,
into thy hands I commend my spirit. They heard all the things that
Christ said, but yet one did not believe and one did. One
confessed that Christ was all and begged, Lord, remember me
when you come into your kingdom. And the other one said, if you
be who you say you are, if you be Christ, save us and yourself. These are the two confessions
by all men. These are the two, from the very
beginning, you have the truth and the lie. The truth and the
lie. This one confession is the lie.
The other confession is the truth. So who maketh thee to differ?
It is God that justifieth. God is the one that caused one
man to see him, and he just left the other man to himself. He
says, if thou be Christ, in verse 39, save thyself and us. He was speaking to God, and he
did not know that he was speaking to God. How scary is that to
you? That scares me. Judas kissed the face of God
and went to hell. That scares me, brethren, to
think, Lord, am I faking this? Have I really been made to see
you? We cannot look to ourself as evident of our salvation.
As soon as we do that, we're not looking to the lamb. We're
not looking to Christ any longer. We're looking to ourself. So
the Lord tells us, look to Christ and live. Look unto him. Amazing grace is the only difference
between these two. And it's the only difference
for you and I. We can't see the evidence in
our life that God saved us. I can see it in my brethren a
lot of times by the confession that you make. But even then,
we see that we're all sinners. We see our sinful state, don't
we? Thanks be to God, He hath put away our sin. And it is His
goodness, and it is His mercy that has made the difference
in the heart of the believer. Grace and mercy doesn't make
us boast or prideful. It does the opposite. It makes
us beggars. It makes us humble. We beg Christ, remember me, personally
asking the Lord. When we come into this place,
that's what we're doing. Lord, would you be pleased to meet
with us? We don't come here being presumptuous, thinking that the
Lord's going to meet with us or that he's obligated to meet
with us. The Lord cannot lie, and he promised where two or
three are gathered together in my name, there I am in the midst.
Are we gathering together in his name? Because if left to
myself, I'll forget why we're even here. I need the Lord to
turn me as he turned this one man, this one thief. Both of
these men were dying. They're being put to death for
the exact same crime. They were thieves. They were
robbers. And one wanted to be God because he didn't confess
who Christ was. That's what it means to not confess
Christ, that he's not good enough, that you have a righteousness
of your own. But these two men, the only difference was that
Christ caused one of them to believe, to confess something
different. Lord, remember me when you come
into that kingdom. He acknowledged who he was, didn't
he? He called him Lord. He called him Lord. He acknowledged
his deity. He saw his humanity, but he acknowledged
his deity. You and I have to be made to
see Christ, made to see Christ as our savior. We can't choose
to do that. It's evident because the one man beside of him did
not believe him, but the other did. We don't find it amazing
that God hated Esau. I can understand why he hated
Esau. I can understand why he would hate me. I can understand
why he would hate my children. They're my offspring, and I see
all my flaws in them. All that we can produce in our
children, we spend most of our time trying to beat the bat out
of our children, if I could say it that way. No, I don't beat
my children, but you understand what I'm saying. And really,
we're just chasing ourself because we just see ourself reflected.
But really, it comes all the way from our father, Adam, and
we're all born in sin the same way. We need a savior. We need
a savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. We need to acknowledge that He
is Lord and we are sinful. That He's the Savior and He saved
His people. And realize that there is nothing
that we've done to merit this. Nothing that we can do to earn
this or to get this. That it is a gift bestowed upon
the Lord's people. There's only two confessions
in this world. The one I just mentioned. Christ
is all. Lord, remember me. That it is
finished or it is not. I was speaking to Steve the other
day and he was mentioning about a circumstance that he was dealing
with and he made this statement to me. I loved it. He said, you
know, I know that it's already done. It's already done. He says,
I don't know why I'm worried about it. And I've never really
heard it put quite like that, but I love it. That's exactly
how it is. If we could just understand that all of this is finished,
salvation has been accomplished. We're just going through the
motions of what the Lord's purpose and it came to pass. That's what
you'll find throughout the entire canon of scripture. and it came
to pass and it came to pass and that's the Lord causing it to
come to pass. But it's either it's finished
or it's not. It's that simple. That's the two confessions. Either
it's finished or it's not. Either it's done and it's over
with and God is sitting on his throne or he's not. He's wringing
his hands. If he's not seated, that means
he's standing and he's wringing his hands trying to get people
to let him into their heart. That's not true, brethren. That's
the two different confessions. Either he's Lord or he's not.
And Christ is Lord. The Lord Jesus Christ is God. Successfully saved His people. So what is our confession? Is
our confession that Christ is all? If it is, it's because He's
given us faith. He's given us repentance towards
God and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. He's given you that confession. If it's your confession, it's
because it's been bestowed upon you. Elijah was on Mount Carmel. with 400 prophets of Baal, and
they had a, if you wanna call it a showdown, it wasn't a showdown.
I mean, you can't even put it like that. You know, in the Wild
West, they would go out, and one guy would get on one side, and
the other would get on the other side, and last guy standing was the winner.
Well, Baal didn't even exist, so you can't say it was a showdown
in that regard. It just, you know what I mean?
It didn't exist. But he tells them, well, you
call upon your God, and I'll call upon mine, and the one that
answers by fire, let it be known that he is God. And so they start
doing that. And it said they cried up to
the noonday even pass and they started cutting themselves and
Elijah started mocking him and said, well, cry a little bit
louder. Maybe he's on a journey or maybe sleeping. You know,
cry a little bit. He's mocking him. And you know
what happened when Elijah began to ask the Lord when he called
upon the Lord, the Lord rained down fire from heaven and it
licked up the water that was poured upon the altar. and it
consumed the sacrifice, which is a picture of our Lord and
our substitute, Jesus Christ, dying for His people. And the
fiery judgment of God's wrath fell upon Him, and God was satisfied
with His sacrifice. You know what Elijah asked those
prophets of Baal? Why halt ye between two opinions?
If God be God, serve Him. But if Baal, then serve Him.
That's two opinions. That's two different confessions,
isn't it brethren? And that's the same today. Either Christ
is Lord, serve him or he's not and serve yourself. It's that
simple. It's that simple. In closing, I want to read the
rest of this. Down to verse 46. in verse 42 of Luke 23, and it
says, and it was about the sixth hour, and there was a darkness
over all the earth until the ninth hour. And the sun was darkened
and the veil of the temple was rent in the midst. And when Jesus
had cried with a loud voice, he said, Father, into thy hands,
I commend my spirit. And having said thus, he gave
up the ghost. Now all Christian, and I'm gonna
put parentheses, with my fingers when I say Christian because
that's been used so so often that it's lost its luster
in the or it's lost its true meaning. Let's put it that way.
A Christian means that we're in Christ that we're Christ like
and the only way we can be Christ like as if we're in him, because
no man can be holy and no man can be good. So we have to be
in Christ. That's what Christian means.
So I don't mind using it. But when I say Christian religion,
I'm not talking about the believers. I'm not talking about the elect
of God. I'm talking about everybody else that's trying to get to
heaven by some other means, besides Christ alone. All Christian religions,
they preach that Christ died, and that Christ was buried, and
that Christ rose again. But then they say something along
the lines of you have to do your part. You have to do your part
to be saved. You have to come up here and
say a prayer. You have to let him into your heart. You have
to, whenever they use the terms, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ,
it's something that they produce to believe. It's something that
they lay hold of, so to speak. But this is not what we believe.
The death, the burial, and the resurrection was not just an
offering It was not an offering to man at all. It was an offering
to the father in the father was pleased with his son. The father
was pleased with the sacrifice of Christ, so his death, his
burial, his resurrection accomplished something. It wasn't an attempt.
It accomplished salvation. We were resurrected as one with
him. We were resurrected. And made
one. with him. He was raised for our
justification. We have union with him. I read
in Genesis chapter two to start the service and it talked about
how man shall leave his father and mother and cleave to this
and to his wife and they twain shall be one flesh. And he said
this is her name shall be woman for she's bone of my bone and
flesh of my flesh. How God sees it is how it really
is. And God sees us in Christ as
one. He does not see me. He sees the
blood of the lamb. That is our hope. He does not
see you. He sees you in the Lord Jesus
Christ by the substitution that Christ did draw on the cross
of Calvary. From creation, we see two being
made as one all the way from Genesis through different things
that take place and transpire. And it's all to point us to one
thing, the Lord Jesus Christ, that He chose His people to have
union with Him in His body, that they would be made perfectly
righteous with Him, that they would be seated in Him right
now in the heavenlies. The Lord said it like this, I
am the vine, the true vine, and you are the branches. Well, that's
two, isn't it? The vine and the branches, but they're one, aren't
they? They're one. He's our shepherd. and we're
his sheep. Well, that's two, the shepherd
and the sheep, but yet we're one. We are his people and the
sheep of his pasture. He is our husband. We are his
bride. And the Lord said, they shall
be my people and I will be their God. As believers, we have the
same confession as the law and the prophets did, that Christ
is all. We have been made the chief of sinners and shut up
to the Lord Jesus Christ as our only hope in salvation. As believers,
we confess that the body and the blood of Christ is all our
righteousness before the Father. Our righteousness is as filthy
rags. We are as mercy beggars. We beg for the water and the
blood of Christ. We plead for mercy. We beg for
his water, his gospel and the the salvation that it brings
through his spirit. We desire the milk and the honey
that the Lord has given to his people. Our confession is the confession,
remember me. Remember me, and thou comest
into thy kingdom. And if that is your confession,
then two have been made one in holy matrimony, in the person
of Jesus Christ. We have been made one with Him.
Perfect union. Father, we pray that You would
bless Your Word. Cause us to be found in You, looking unto
You, is the author and finisher of our faith. Thank you for salvation. Keep us. Keep us looking unto
you. Keep us from ourself. We ask
these things in Christ's name. Amen.